


Disillusions and Confusion

by daniomalley



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Horror, M/M, Murder, Past Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-13
Updated: 2014-08-13
Packaged: 2018-02-12 16:53:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2117535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daniomalley/pseuds/daniomalley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jared and Jensen are excited to move into their dream house in a new town, but as they settle in, things don't seem quite right. There's something in the house with them, and it doesn't welcome intruders...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Disillusions and Confusion

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much to [bellagattino](http://bellagattino.livejournal.com/) for putting together some awesome artwork for this. You can see the artwork [here](http://bellagattino.livejournal.com/27439.html). It is very slightly spoilery.  
> Thanks also to [Sylvia_Locust](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Sylvia_Locust) for betaing this and getting it into shape.

[ ](http://s1246.photobucket.com/user/daniomalley22/media/DCBB14_zps5303b7ff.jpg.html)

Jared gently tugged the bed covers down to reveal Jensen’s messy bed-head. “Jensen,” he whispered. “Jensen. Wake up. Know what day it is?”

Jensen grumbled under his breath but didn’t move. “Sleeping-In Day?” he mumbled.

“It’s moving day!” Jared said eagerly. “Come on, you need to get up.”

“I hate moving,” Jensen groaned, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.

“I know, but it will all be over after today. We won’t have to live in a motel anymore, we’ll be sleeping in our awesome new house.” Excited, Jared bounced on the mattress a little, and Jensen stretched and finally stood up.

Jared was really, _really_ , ready to be done with the motel. They’d been living there for three weeks, while they finalised their purchase of the house and signed paperwork and got everything organised. All their belongings were in storage until they could move in, so they’d both been living out of two suitcases and one overnight bag, and eating takeout for every meal. 

Jensen didn’t seem to be feeling it quite as much. They’d moved to Clayton because Jensen had been offered a great job, and he’d started working the day after they arrived. Jared, meanwhile, had spent the days talking to the bank, the real estate agent, and a lawyer, arranging to get utilities connected, locks changed, and moving vans hired. In between all that, he’d been looking for work too. He was starting to get a little tired of living in one tiny room.

They collected the house keys and then picked up the van they’d rented for the day. They drove to the storage facility and loaded the van up, and then headed across town to the house. Jared was driving the van while Jensen drove their car; Jensen quickly slipped through the traffic and left Jared behind. Jared snickered when he realised that he had the house keys. Jensen might get there first, but he would still have to wait for Jared.

Jared couldn’t hold back a huge smile as he turned into their new street. It was nice; some of the houses were a little run down, but most of them looked warm and welcoming and had well-kept gardens. Jared could imagine going for walks on the weekends. He pulled into the driveway of their new house and got out of the van. On the opposite side of the street, a teenage girl was leaning against her front fence and watching them. Jared waved, but she didn’t wave back.

He loved the house they’d managed to buy. After years of renting, they’d finally managed to save up enough to buy their own house. At first they’d been looking at small apartments and run down houses, but they’d been really lucky to find a small but not very old house in good repair, located in a pretty nice neighbourhood and on the market for a bargain price. It was like it was meant to be.

Jared waved cheerily to Jensen who was waiting for him impatiently. Jared jumped out of the cab and walked across the lawn, keys in hand, looking up at the house. Their new home. He climbed the concrete steps of the porch. Even the rickety bench seat and the dead leaves gathered in one corner looked fresh and exciting to his eyes. Jared fit the key to the lock and glanced over to meet Jensen’s eyes.

“You ready for this?” he asked, grinning.

“Just do it, Jared,” Jensen grumbled, but the corners of his mouth were relentlessly curving upward. Jared turned the key and opened the door. 

They walked through the house one more time to check that everything was in good condition before beginning to unload the truck. It didn’t take all that long. The front door opened onto a hallway. To the right was the master bedroom, and to the left was an open plan living, dining and kitchen area. Jared walked through to the kitchen where another door led back into the hallway. 

They’d been talking about ideas for redoing the back of the house ever since they’d first seen it. Across from the kitchen was the master bath, and to the left the hallway ended with a back door opening onto a deck. A tiny laundry was tucked beneath the stairs, which led up to a small second floor, just big enough for a second bedroom, narrow bathroom and a little storage space, lit by dormer windows. Jared found the entire house utterly charming.

“Okay, let’s go get everything!” he said at last. He couldn’t wait to start bringing in boxes, to see what the bedroom would look like with his shirts and Jensen’s ties scattered everywhere, to find out if the bookshelf would fit in that corner as perfectly as he thought it would. 

They agreed to start with the largest, heaviest items of furniture, because it was already turning into a pretty warm day and their energy wasn’t likely to last long. Their bed was the first thing to come off the truck. It was just a double and if Jared stretched out in his sleep his feet slipped off the end, but he loved it anyway. They got the head and foot screwed to the frame, and then squabbled over whether to position it facing the door or the window.

Once the bed was in place, facing the door, (although Jared hadn’t lost the argument, he’d just strategically retreated) they went to get the mattress. The money they hadn’t spent on the bed frame they’d spent on the mattress instead. It was huge and soft, and as a result, very heavy. Jared’s arms were tiring once they got through the front door, and he paused in the hallway. Jensen walked into the other end of the mattress, knocking Jared back and grumbling about it.

“Damn it, Jared, a little warning would be great next time!” Jensen snarked.

Jared snickered. “Ooops,” he said. “Sorry.” He made to lift the mattress up again and angle it towards the bedroom door, but before he could step through the entry the door blew shut in his face. 

“Lucky you weren’t any closer,” Jensen observed wryly, “or it would have flattened your nose.”

“Ha, ha,” Jared replied.

The rest of the day passed in much the same way. It took longer than Jared had expected to get all the heavy stuff off the truck; he hadn’t anticipated how awkward it would be to manoeuvre everything into place inside the house. By the time they’d progressed to opening boxes and unpacking them, he was aching all over. 

Jared took a box of carefully wrapped picture frames into the bedroom and began arranging them on the dresser. There were a few that wouldn’t fit; to keep them from cluttering up the house while they were trying to unpack, Jared wrapped them back up and put them back in the box, which he took upstairs. They didn’t need to use the upstairs rooms for anything, and it was nice to have a little space for storage. It was a luxury they weren’t used to.

Jensen must have found the radio, because Jared could hear music playing as he walked through the hallway. The late afternoon sun was shining through the back door’s window, and it made the hallway feel warm and homey. Terracotta tiles were laid in the kitchen and bathroom, and across the hall in between to create a little space where people could leave their shoes or wet coats and umbrellas. The tiles weren’t shiny, but the light brought out a sort of glow in them. Even though he was tired and achy, Jared felt a broad smile burst onto his face again at the idea that this was all theirs.

They had toasted sandwiches for dinner. Jared had planned to cook an actual meal, but they were both too tired and he couldn’t face another night of fast food. Jensen got the TV working while Jared sliced cheese and ham, and they ate sitting on the couch while watching the news.

“I don’t think I’m up to any more unpacking tonight,” Jensen said once they’d eaten. “I can feel myself starting to doze off just sitting here. I think I’m going to get an early night and start again in the morning.”

“Sounds like a great idea,” said Jared. “I think I’m going to have a bath before I join you.”

Jensen smirked. “You’ve had your eye on that bathtub all day; I bet it’s the whole reason why you wanted this house so bad.”

“I’m not denying it, baths are awesome,” Jared replied easily. Jensen wouldn’t be laughing at him in the morning when he was stiff and sore and Jared felt great thanks to a long soak in hot water.

The bathroom, like the rest of the house, was slightly dated, and the layout didn’t really make the best use of the space available. Jared and Jensen had discussed updating the room, but Jared had come down firmly in favour of keeping the bathtub as it was. It was large and deep, enough so that even Jared would be able to stretch out in it.

He put the plug in and started filling the tub, testing the temperature of the water to make sure it was right. Once he was sure Jensen was in the bedroom and not around to tease him, Jared added some bubble bath and lavender oil, then got undressed. He shivered as he pulled off his shirt. 

It was dark and the night seemed to have suddenly become chilly. Jared waited impatiently for the tub to fill and collected shampoo and soap from where they’d been dumped in the cabinet. He glanced at his reflection in the mirror above the sink, noticing the way his hair was so messed up with dust and sweat that it nearly stood on end. The bottom left corner of the mirror was cracked, and black lines ran out from the frame in a lopsided ‘X’ shape. The main part of the mirror reflected the shower and bath, but the damaged section near the bottom was angled so that it showed the floor. There was a little section in between that wasn’t visible in the mirror.

Finally, Jared shut the faucet off and went to step into the bath. As he stood there, one foot just touching the water, Jared got the incredibly strong sense of being unwelcome. He paused with his foot dangling in the air, not sure what to do. He dipped his foot further into the bath, and the flesh on the back of his neck crawled. Jared wasn’t sure what to do. He couldn’t face the thought of getting into the bath. He couldn’t articulate why, not even to himself, but he’d never felt such a strong urge _go somewhere else, right now_. 

Jared pulled his foot out of the bath, and dried it off. It was late and he was really tired; if he tried to take a bath now he’d probably fall asleep and drown in the bathtub, which would be a terribly embarrassing way to go. He walked up the hall to the bedroom in the nude and pulled on a pair of track pants to sleep in. “That was quick,” Jensen mumbled, but he was half asleep already and Jared didn’t bother to answer.

***

There was plenty more unpacking to keep them busy throughout the next day. Plates, glasses and cutlery needed to be put away. Books, DVDs and CDs needed to be arranged on their shelves. Boxes of bed sheets and towels needed to be stacked in the linen cupboard. Jared was organising their video game collection and could hear Jensen clattering around in the bathroom, because he hadn’t unpacked his toiletries the day before when Jared had suggested it. He must have been struggling to fit everything in, because he sure was slamming the cupboard doors around.

Later on, once the games were arranged to Jared’s exacting standards, he called out to Jensen at the other end of the house. “Hey, once you’re finished unpacking your stuff in the bathroom, do you want to run to the grocery store to get something for dinner?”

“Once I’ve finished in the bathroom?” Jensen asked, walking over through the kitchen. “I haven’t even started yet.”

“Jeez, Jensen, what have you been doing all afternoon?” Jared asked, exasperated.

Jensen snickered. “Sorry, Jared, I’ve been a little busy, you know? Shit, look out!”

The bookshelf that they’d positioned carefully against the wall gave a wobble and several books fell off it. Jensen darted over to steady it and Jared picked the books up.

“We need to get some chocks to put under this,” Jensen said, testing the balance of the bookshelf. “Need to make sure that doesn’t happen again.” 

While the toasted sandwiches the day before had been good, the steak with salad that they had that night was almost impossibly delicious. “Should I leave you two alone?” Jensen quipped. Jared smirked at him.

Jared didn’t go near the bath again, opting instead to have a shower before he went to bed. The shower was separate from the tub and kind of cramped, but it was hot with awesome water pressure. Jared washed the dust and sweat of the day off, washed his hair, and stood a little while longer under the hot spray. When he shut the faucet off, something caught his eye, words just faintly visible on the glass shower door. Jared crouched down to see if he could make them out. ‘HELP ME’ was spelled out in large, shaky capitals.

Jared shook his head and stepped out of the shower cubicle. He probably should have scrubbed it before using it; it was kind of gross to realise that he’d been washing himself in the previous occupant’s mess and soap scum and, apparently, their penchant for writing on the steamy shower walls. Cleaning the shower could be a job for tomorrow when Jensen was at work.

***

Jared had a job interview the next morning. He put on a freshly ironed shirt and neatened his hair, then set out to drive the few blocks to his interview.

A local middle school was looking for someone to work the reception desk part time. Jared hadn’t worked in a school before, but he had administration experience, good references and a police check, and he had secured a job by the time he left. He’d be working two full days and two half days a week; a bit less than he would have liked, but it would do for now.

Jared drove home afterwards, planning to jump right in and give the bathroom the scrubbing it desperately needed. He pulled into the driveway and glanced up at the dormer window – maybe movement caught his eye, because he was sure he saw the curtain twitching. When Jared looked closer, he thought he could make out a vaguely human shape in the window. Maybe it was a shadow – but maybe it was a head, turned his way. Maybe someone was watching him, from the upstairs room of his house.

His heart began to pound. Who was up there? It couldn’t be Jensen – his car wasn’t in the driveway, so he hadn’t come home from work early. Jared climbed the steps to the front porch with trepidation.

“Hello?” he called, opening the front door. “Hello? Is someone here?” Jared wondered if he should be warning a possible intruder that he was coming into the house – but, whoever they were had been watching when he’d pulled up in the driveway anyway. Jared looked around the hallway for something heavy, but when unpacking he and Jensen had completely neglected the whole category of baseball bats, golf clubs and heavy flashlights. Jared pulled opened the drawer of the hall stand and pulled out a collapsible umbrella, but as a self-defence weapon he thought it lacked a certain something.

“Who’s there?” Jared called, inching towards the staircase. The house was silent, quiet enough that he could hear his own breath whistling between his teeth. He tried to breathe more quietly, afraid that if anyone tried to sneak up on him, he might now hear them over the sound of his breathing and the blood rushing through his head. “I’m coming up!” Jared added, shouting a little louder this time.

Were they still up there? Jared didn’t think they would have had time to run down the stairs and out the back door before he’d opened the front. That didn’t mean they were still in the spare bedroom, though. They could be anywhere, waiting just out of sight. With every step he took up the staircase, his head swivelled in every direction, looking for any sign that someone was there.

At the top of the stairs he scanned the room quickly, but there was no one to be seen. A few boxes lay scattered around, but none big enough for someone to hide behind. Jared crossed quickly to the little bathroom and shoved the door open, raising the umbrella, but again no one was inside. That left the spare bedroom.

Jared nudged the door open gingerly and stood back, trying to see into the room before he stepped through. He couldn’t see anyone. 

“Hello?” he called one last time. When there was no answer, he stepped into the room. Patchy light shone through the window, broken up by the tree in the front yard. It seemed dusty, even though Jared knew everything had been clean when they moved in. His feet landed on the floor softly, the carpet absorbing all the sound.

Sometime between when he’d last come up here and now, Jensen must have come up and put the room in order. Their futon bed was in the corner and made up. All the other mismatched bedroom furniture they’d collected over the years was up here too; the ugly bedside table and the old-fashioned lamp, the dresser with a bottom drawer which wouldn’t open, and the armchair they both liked but which didn’t fit in the living room. Jensen had put it by the window, and he’d left his jacket draped over it.

Jared picked up the denim jacket and looked at it. Maybe this was what he’d seen from down in the driveway. Some harmless trick, an illusion made of light and shadows. It was obvious now that there was no one inside the house. He felt foolish.

Jared went back downstairs, carrying the jacket with him. He moved quickly, letting his shoes clatter on the wooden stairs, as though he was pushing away the caution and fear he’d taken up with him. He nearly stumbled when he reached the first landing and heard music begin to play, a male voice shrieking “Pours my beer!” and the sudden intrusion of sound took him by surprise. 

“Stupid,” Jared muttered when he realised what had happened. It was probably coming from the house next door or a car in the street. He put the unsettling episode out of his mind and got to work cleaning the bathroom.

***

“We need to celebrate!” Jared announced as soon as Jensen got home.

“Celebrate?” Jensen repeated, looking briefly confused. “You got the job?” he guessed.

“I got the job,” Jared confirmed. “So I picked up a bottle of champagne and some oysters. I’ve got _plans_ for tonight.”

“Oh, really?” Jensen said with a leer. “Do tell me more.”

Jared grinned and led Jensen to the dining room where he’d already served up the celebration dinner he’d made. He grabbed the champagne and began working the cork free.

“How did you get the upstairs bedroom all set up yesterday without me noticing?” Jared asked as he poured them both a glass.

“I have no idea. I guess you’re just not very observant,” Jensen answered. “I did it while you were clattering around in the bathroom.”

“I wasn’t working on the bathroom yesterday, that was _you_!” Jared protested.

“No it wasn’t!” Jensen smirked. “Whatever, you just don’t want to admit that you have opinions about the correct way to hang toilet paper.”

“Okay, Jensen, have it your way.”

***

While Jared was happy to have a job, it did have some sucky parts, like being at work at seven in the morning. When he headed out the door, jacket in one hand and coffee in a travel mug in the other, Jensen was still in bed.

He arrived at the school and was given a whirlwind tour by his immediate supervisor, Samantha. They came back to the front office and she began explaining the computer system he’d need to use.

“Part of your job will be logging attendance. It’s all done electronically, but notification about excused absences should come to you, and then you’ll need to log it here...” Sam showed him the basics, and then said, “If we get time later today, I’ll show you how to accept payments. For now, just come get me if you have any questions. I’ll be over here, working on this nightmare of a budget.”

Jared got to work. In the time before classes began, a bunch of people came by his desk for different reasons. Some dropped off lost property, a few returned permission slips for field trips. A couple had questions that he had to refer to Sam, but all in all, it went pretty smoothly. The bell rang and things quietened down. A few phone calls came in from parents who were keeping their kids home due to sickness; Jared entered the information into the computer.

He knew he was working slowly, but he was being careful and trying not to make any huge mistakes. The other staff were all friendly, and Jared thought he could grow to like this job. On his lunchbreak, he checked his phone to see that he’d got a text message from Jensen.

 _How’s yr 1st day going?_ it asked. Jared texted back, _Gr8 so far, how’s yrs?_ , and went to buy something to eat.

 _Thinking about the house, maybe start renovating soon?_ came the reply. Jared considered it. It was sooner than they’d been planning on, but after a few days he was already thinking how much nicer it would be if the kitchen were more up to date, and the bathroom more spacious. Since Jared had found a new job so quickly, there probably wasn’t any harm getting started.

 _Can look at bathrooms on weekend?_ Jared suggested, and Jensen sent him back a smiley face in reply.

After dinner that night, they grabbed paper and pencils and started making sketches of their plans. 

“I think we should swap the cabinet and the toilet,” Jensen said, drawing quickly. “It’ll give us so much more space.”

“That would cost more.”

“Yeah, but I think we need to. If we keep the toilet where it is, it really limits what we can change.”

“Okay. And we have to get a new shower cubicle, the one in there now is way too small,” Jared added.

“Do you think we should re-tile? I know it would be a pain in the ass, but think how awesome it could look!” 

Jared thought about it. The bathroom tiles at the moment were kind of ugly. “If we’re going to go to that much trouble, maybe we should replace the bath as well.”

“Really? I thought you loved that bath. You raved about it when we bought the place.”

“Well, yeah, but...” Jared didn’t really want to admit that his change of heart concerning the bathtub came from nothing more than a creepy feeling. “If we change everything else, the bath won’t match anymore. And it’s still a little room; if we want to make everything bigger, it’s going to get more cramped, not less. What if we get a nice whirlpool bath, and have the shower over it? There’d be more space all around.” Jared sketched his idea, putting a generously-sized bathtub in the corner, leaving the toilet where it was but moving the cabinet to where the shower currently sat.

“That’s a great idea,” Jensen said thoughtfully. “Even you wouldn’t be cramped in the shower if we did that.”

“I can think of a few other things we can do in there as well,” Jared said cheekily.

“Oh, really? Like what?” Jensen said, playing innocent until Jared leaned on him and pushed him over into the couch cushions. “Oh, I get it,” Jensen said, giggling. “You mean sex. Nookie. Fucking. Playing hide the cucumber...”

“Oh my God, shut _up_ ,” Jared groaned. He put his hands on Jensen’s hips and settled himself above Jensen on the couch, enjoying the way his eyes darkened and he involuntarily pushed his hips upward. For a moment, Jared was distracted by the play of shadows against the wall. It almost looked like... but, no, it was just the leaves of the tree outside blowing in the wind. He looked back down at Jensen.

“Getting distracted?” Jensen asked, grinning wickedly. “I need to lift my game.” He slid his hands up under Jared’s shirt and tweaked one of his nipples. Jared squeaked and shivered, pulling down the collar of Jensen’s shirt to expose his collarbone. He sucked lightly at the skin, but the sound of Jensen’s harsh breathing couldn’t block out the sound of something rattling on the bookshelf. Jared jerked back and looked around.

“You okay, Jared?” Jensen asked, sounding more concerned now. 

There was nothing else in the room. “I’m fine,” Jared said, turning back, but the skin on his shoulder blades was beginning to crawl. An electronic hum nearly made him leap out of his skin until he realised it was just the fridge.

“Jared, seriously,” Jensen said with a frown. “What’s on your mind?”

Jared took a deep breath and forced a bright smile to his lips. “Just you,” he purred seductively. “In those tight pants.” He put one hand to the fly of Jensen’s pants and Jensen made a pleased sound, but then a loud creak echoed through from the back of the house, for all the world as though someone was on the stairs, and Jared flinched again. Jensen took his hands and guided him upright.

“We don’t have to do this right now,” he said gently.

“Yeah. Okay,” Jared said, both disappointed and relieved. “Let’s put a movie on, okay? It’s too quiet in here.” Jensen gave him an odd look at that, which Jared ignored.

***

That weekend, they went to Lowes to look at their tiles and bathroom fixtures, trying to decide on a colour scheme. While they were there, Jared paused to look at the bathroom mirrors, and Jensen laughed at him.

“A new mirror as well? You don’t think we could just keep using the one that’s already there?”

“The whole bottom of it’s cracked, it won’t kill us to get a new one,” Jared said a little testily. He wasn’t about to explain that he’d got out of the shower that morning to see ‘HELP’ written in the foggy bathroom mirror. By the same joker who had written it on the shower door, maybe, except that Jared had never noticed it before and he was pretty sure he’d cleaned the mirror at the same time he’d cleaned the shower. Jensen could have done it, maybe, but it wasn’t his style.

They moved on and grabbed a few tile samples to take home, as well as collecting prices on some different baths and cabinets that they liked. With everything they had seen fresh in their mind, Jared and Jensen headed straight to the bathroom once they arrived home to discuss their ideas.

“Darker tiles might look stylish,” Jensen said, crossing over to the bath as he spoke and trying to turn the faucet off to stop it dripping. It wouldn’t budge. “Christ, this is stiff,” Jensen grumbled, putting both hands to it.

“It depends what else we put in here, I guess,” said Jared, watching Jensen wrestle with the bath. “We don’t want to make it too dark. Here, let me try.”

“Damn thing won’t stop,” Jensen said, stepping out of the way.

Jared swiped a hand under the faucet, and a drop landed on his hand. “Shit, that’s really cold,” Jared said, shaking the water off. “Where are they piping this water in from, an underground lake?” He couldn’t get the tap to move either. “It probably needs a new washer. You’re not supposed to turn them off super tight anyway.”

“Maybe it is just as well we’re replacing the bath,” Jensen said grumpily.

“It’s no big deal,” Jared laughed. “It’s just a leaky tap. They happen. Anyway, what if we went a little more blue...”

They debated cheerfully for thirty minutes or so to make sure, but there was definitely one tile they liked better than the others. Then Jensen grabbed his laptop so they could work out if what they wanted was in their budget.

“I think we can make this work,” Jensen said at last. “If we get the more basic showerhead then we should be able to afford the basin with the nicer finish. If we really want those tiles, though, we’ll have to cut back somewhere else. We won’t be going to the cinema or eating out for a while.”

“I’m okay with that if you are.”

Jensen went to place an order with Lowes and came back grinning. “They said they can deliver next Saturday,” he said, rubbing his hands together. “So we better start ripping up those old tiles ASAP.”

***

The weekend was pretty busy after that. They worked steadily and managed to get most of the tiles pulled up by Sunday night, except for the ones in awkward spots like between the bathtub and the cabinet, and behind the toilet. They’d need to remove the old fixtures before laying down the new tiles anyway, so they left those corners untouched for now. Having to use the upstairs bathroom for everything was a pain, but in some ways it was nice. No one had written on the upstairs mirror, for one thing.

Jared got home from work one afternoon only to realise thirty minutes later that he’d left his cell phone at the school. He cursed and headed to the front door, hoping that he wasn’t too late to go back and get it. He was pretty sure some extra-curricular activity was still running – choir practice or something. It would probably be okay. But when he reached the front door where he usually hung up his car keys, they weren’t there. And although he looked everywhere for them, they didn’t turn up.

As a last resort, Jared came out to the front yard to check whether he’d somehow dropped the keys on the porch after unlocking the front door. They weren’t there, so he walked over to the car and back again, befuddled, even though he _knew_ he had to have had the keys on him to get inside.

A teenage girl was standing on the sidewalk watching him. She looked familiar, but it took Jared a moment to place her – she was the girl who had watched him and Jensen move in. Something about her expression made him wary.

“I think you should know you moved into a house where a girl was murdered,” she said, as though to prove Jared’s reservations correct.

“Um...” Jared said, wondering how he could respond. “You know, it’s kind of not nice to make up stuff like that...”

“I’m not _making it up_!” she snapped, sounding angry. “It happened ages and ages ago. Like, five years. My friend used to live here afterwards, and she told me the house was really creepy and strange stuff happened all the time. It’s true.”

“Uh - okay,” Jared said doubtfully. “I’ll, uh, I’ll keep an eye out, okay?” He looked back at the house with reluctance. His keys weren’t out here; they had to be somewhere inside. He’d have to go back in and keep hunting. He hesitated at the door and looked back to where the girl had stood. She had crossed the road and was going back to her own house; she didn’t look at him before she went inside. 

Jared’s keys were lying on the floor just under the hook he’d hung them on; he must not have noticed them somehow when he’d checked earlier. He grabbed them with a sigh and went to collect his phone.

***

Jared finished work for the day at four. He felt exhausted, and when he got home he collapsed on the couch, not moving except to turn the TV on and switch to reruns of _The Cosby Show_. He was woken some time later by the sound of keys rattling.

Jared started upright, his mind fuzzy and his hair a mess. Keys. Had he lost them again? He’d been careful, kept them in his pocket where he could feel them. He patted the pocket and felt their reassuring weight.

Jensen walked into the room, carrying a grocery bag and flicking on the lights as he passed the switch. “Are you having a nap, you slacker?” he asked.

“I was tired,” Jared protested. “Some of us had to be at work by seven this morning, you know.”

Jensen grinned, unpacking milk and pasta and putting them away. “I’m sorry, baby,” he said, voice mockingly sympathetic. “It’s...” he trailed off when the lights flickered and dimmed briefly, like someone was trying and failing to balance the light switch between ‘on’ and ‘off’. “Geez,” Jensen grumbled, “I hope the wiring in this place isn’t fucked.”

They both waited for a minute, but the light remained steady. “It’s probably nothing,” Jared said. Jensen nodded doubtfully.

Jensen made dinner that night; burritos, which were one of Jared’s favourite foods. They ate in front of the TV, making fun of stupid commercials and coming up with bizarre predictions for the outcome of an episode of _Friends_ that they’d already seen at least twice. Much later, Jensen got up to take care of the dishes, but Jared grabbed his arm.

“Want to leave those till tomorrow?” he suggested. “I’ve got a much more fun idea for something to do.”

Jensen must have liked that idea because he already had his shirt off by the time they made it to the bedroom. He was trying to get Jared’s shirt off before he could even close the door – in fact, Jared ended up not bothering about the door at all. It wasn’t worth paying attention to that with Jensen right in front of him, eyes wide with lust and cheeks flushed with excitement.

Jared got Jensen’s pants halfway off and nudged him back onto the bed, not wanting to wait any longer to get his mouth on the other man. Jared put his hands on Jensen’s hips to keep him still and got down between Jensen’s knees. “Your legs,” he breathed.

“Your _arms_ ,” Jensen responded. “It’s... nnngh...” He trailed off as Jared licked his cock from the root to the tip. Jared put the head in his mouth, and at first sucked lightly, teasing. Jensen’s hands scrabbled at Jared’s hair, and he took Jensen deeper.

Jared flicked a sly glance upwards at Jensen’s flushed, awed face, and reached down to tease his balls with the fingertips of one hand. While Jensen writhed, Jared rubbed his perineum and let his fingers brush over Jensen’s hole. Jensen collected himself enough to try to reach for the lube they’d dropped in one of the dresser drawers, and Jared enjoyed trying to distract him. He slid the very tip of his finger into Jensen’s hole and hummed at the same time, and Jensen squeaked.

Jensen finally got the tube of lube out and tapped Jared on the head with it – a little harder than he’d intended, perhaps, but Jared couldn’t blame him for that. He poured some into his hand and began fingering Jensen in earnest, waiting until he was moments from coming before taking his mouth from Jensen’s cock.

“Fu-uuck,” Jensen whined as Jared pushed him to lie down on the bed. He lifted Jensen’s legs up onto his shoulders and lined himself up. “Come on, come on, come on,” Jensen urged him, his words becoming nonsense as Jared took his dick in a firm grasp.

Jared leaned forward so that Jensen’s knees were pushed back towards his head and his hips were tilted up. Jensen couldn’t move much in that position, but that didn’t stop him trying to push down onto Jared’s cock. He tossed his head back and forth on the pillow and Jared was lost in the sight; it was hard to imagine anything more beautiful than that moment. After Jensen came, Jared adjusted his angle and thrust deeply. Jensen panted and grabbed Jared’s hands while he shuddered through his climax.

Jensen smiled sleepily as Jared cleaned them both up. “Aren’t you glad I had that nap now?” Jared teased.

“Can’t talk,” Jensen answered. “Sleepy.”

Jared snickered, but he was asleep in just a few minutes himself. 

***

Jared dreamed that he was late for a math test. He was at his locker, the dented, puke-green locker he remembered from his high school. He pulled his books out and stacked them up as fast as he could; maybe he could get to class and not be too late. Math textbook, Science, History, Environment, Economics. Jared wasn’t sure why he’d need all his textbooks, but he knew that he would.

Jared stepped back from his locker and the door slammed shut with a thud. He raced down the hallway balancing the books unsteadily in his arms. One of them slid off the stack and thumped to the ground; Jared leaned over to pick it up but the next book slid off too, and hit the ground louder than the first. He could see the door of the math classroom open ahead, and he started to run towards it, abandoning the books. If he could just make it before the door closed, he would still be able to sit his test. Just as he reached the doorway the door slammed closed with a bang so loud it woke Jared up.

Jared jerked upright in the bed, startled, heart thumping. It was quiet but a half-memory of some noise lingered. He strained his ears, but a second later another bang echoed through the house, and then another.

Jared shuffled towards the edge of the bed. He wasn’t sure what was making that noise, but it needed to be checked out. And then his alert ears picked up a different sound.

“Help,” he heard a voice call faintly. “Help me.” 

Jared scrambled back towards Jensen and reached for his arm. There was another bang, and the voice called “Help!”

“Jensen,” Jared whispered, shaking him by the arm. “Jensen, wake up! Someone’s in the house!”

“Mmmuh?” Jensen mumbled sleepily. “Jared. ‘s’late.” 

Jared listened again. The banging had stopped and in its place, music played, a song that sounded vaguely familiar. _‘Something ain’t right,’_ Jared heard, and the skin on the back of his neck began to crawl. “Listen, Jensen,” Jared whispered.

“Music,” Jensen murmured, waking up a little. “Probably coming from next door. Go back to sleep.” Jensen rolled over and began snoring again almost immediately.

Jared glared at Jensen’s sleeping form and threw the covers back roughly. He went to the hallway, thinking that it would serve Jensen right if he was murdered by an intruder. Jared switched on the hallway light, taking no notice of Jensen’s annoyed grunt. 

The music got a little louder once he was out in the hall. Jared looked around, going into the living room and walking through, turning lights on as he went. He didn’t call out, slightly afraid that if he did he might get a reply he didn’t want. Jared walked through the kitchen and back into the hall, crossed it to reach the bathroom and switched that light on as well. The moment the bright light flooded the little room, the music fell abruptly silent. Jared looked in every corner, eyes wide, but saw nothing. 

As Jared waited, normal night-time sounds resumed, sounds that he hadn’t even noticed were absent. The sound of a large bird taking flight outside, a car passing in the street, a dog barking half a block away. He couldn’t explain it, but the unbearable tension had broken and the house was, once more, just a house. For the sake of thoroughness, Jared climbed the stairs to investigate the second floor, but he didn’t really expect to find anyone up there.

He searched the upstairs carefully nonetheless, checking behind the shower curtain and in all the cupboards and pulling open the built-in closet in the bedroom. When he closed the closet door, he heard a thump, and when he opened it again, something flew at his head.

“Aaaah!” Jared shouted, leaping back. The object landed on the floor. It was a small, hardcover book. It hadn’t flown at his head at all, just fallen down from the shelf it had been resting on. Jared rolled his eyes at his own jumpiness, and picked the book up to take downstairs.

Even though he’d confirmed that there was nothing to fear in the house, Jared didn’t sleep well for the rest of the night.

***

The next day was one of Jared’s half-days; he only had to work until noon. He stopped at a sandwich shop to get something for lunch rather than eating at home, and once he’d finished he decided that it was a great chance to see a little bit of their new city. He spent a couple of hours walking through a park and taking photos of the gardens. It wasn’t the sort of thing he’d usually take an interest in, but today it suddenly seemed like an awesome idea.

He headed for home once he was forced to admit that he was really just avoiding being in the house by himself. He sat in the driveway for a good ten minutes, daring a shadowy figure to appear in the dormer window. Nothing happened, and Jared shook his head, cursing his overactive imagination.

Inside, the house was quiet and still, like it was mocking Jared’s fears. He turned the TV up for company and went to get a snack out of the pantry. On the kitchen bench he saw the book he’d found the previous night and then forgotten about.

It had a light blue cover with yellow flowers on it. When Jared picked it up and opened it, he realised it was a journal, with page after page filled with handwriting in blue ink. Someone must have left it behind when they moved out of the house. Flicking through the entries, a date caught Jared’s eye, a date five years in the past. It must have been hidden in that closet for a long time. Jared wondered why his half-assed investigation had managed to uncover it, when it had remained safely hidden through five years of occupancy.

When he turned the page, different phrases began to jump out at him. _’I’m getting out of here the second I turn eighteen’_ was written on one page, _’I wonder what all his friends would think if they knew what kind of man he is’_ said another. The next page said _’I hate the way she never stands up for me’_.

Becoming increasingly concerned, Jared turned to the last entry. _’I feel scared all the time now. I think something really bad is going to happen’_ was all it said. The hairs stood up on the back of Jared’s neck. He flicked through the whole journal, trying to work out who had written it. The writer never mentioned their name or age, but the diary was five years old. Jared hoped that they’d reached eighteen and got out of whatever bad situation they’d been in. He hoped they’d managed to get away. He couldn’t help but remember the story the girl from across the road had told him; at the time, it had seemed ludicrous, but now he felt an urgent need to know if there was any truth to it.

Jared grabbed his laptop and opened his web browser. He considered for a moment, then typed ‘Canning Street’ into the search bar and hit enter.

 _’Canning Street Murder Parents Sentenced’_ was the first result. Jared clicked on the headline, feeling suddenly uneasy.

> A couple who allowed their fifteen year old daughter to die of her injuries rather than seek medical help were sentenced today.
> 
> The court heard that Brian Trotter had a history of abusive behaviour and that on the 18th of June last year, he violently attacked his daughter causing injuries which resulted in her death. Trotter confessed to striking his daughter and pushing her down the stairs. 
> 
> When the Trotters realised that their daughter was severely injured, they chose to conceal her inside the house rather than seek medical attention. Rachel Trotter told the court that she and her husband kept their daughter hidden in the downstairs bathroom of their home for almost two days until she died.
> 
> The court heard that the Trotters played music loudly to drown out their daughter’s cries for help, and that once she was dead they dumped her body in a landfill. Rachel Trotter told the court, “I thought we could keep it hidden, but I couldn’t take it. I had to come forward.”
> 
> Brian Trotter was sentenced to life in prison for murder and concealing a crime. Rachel Trotter was charged as an accessory and sentenced to seven years in prison.

When Jensen arrived home from work several hours later, Jared was sitting on the front lawn. “What are you doing out here?” he asked as he climbed out of his car.

Jared didn’t answer, keeping his gaze on the front of the house. Jensen reached his side and put a hand on Jared’s shoulder. “Jared?” he repeated. “What’s going on?”

“It’s haunted, Jensen,” Jared replied in a small voice. “Our house is haunted.”

***

It took around thirty minutes for Jensen to calm Jared down and convince him to come back into the house so that he could show Jensen the articles and the journal and try to explain himself.

“She lived up in the upstairs bedroom, and she hid this up there,” Jared said as Jensen flipped through the journal. “I saw someone in the window up there the other day, but when I went up to the room no one was there. I found this journal last night because I heard someone calling for help and I went looking for them. We keep hearing music, and it’s always the same song, have you noticed that? And I keep seeing writing on the glass in the bathroom – the mirror and the shower door. There’s something in this house!”

“Jared...” Jensen said, hesitantly like he wasn’t sure how Jared would react, “don’t you think that’s kind of a stretch? I haven’t noticed anything like that.”

“Because you haven’t been paying attention!” Jared snapped. “You read the articles, right? She died in this house!”

“Yeah, I read the articles, Jared, and it’s horrible, but we don’t know that – it could be any house on the street . We don’t know if that girl is the same one who wrote the journal.”

“Then it would be a hell of a coincidence!”

“Look, I’m sorry, Jared, but...”

The globe illuminating the dining table burst in a shower of sparks. Jensen ducked, while Jared squeaked and jumped backwards. He looked around frantically, like he was expecting an attack to materialise from nowhere. Jensen was looking at him oddly, and Jared tried to compose himself. Not just for Jensen’s benefit – he didn’t want the house to know it was getting to him. Under normal circumstances, having that thought would have made Jared laugh at himself, but now it didn’t seem so funny.

Jared took a deep breath and tried to calm himself. “That’s another thing,” Jared said emphatically. “When either of us says – that – she doesn’t like it.”

“Says _what_?” Jensen asked, puzzled.

“You know what I mean!” Jared snapped.

“Sor-“

“Don’t say it!”

“Okay, Jared,” Jensen said with exaggerated patience. “I can see you’re really upset about this, but I bet if you just get some sleep and calm down, you’ll feel better.”

“I’m not imagining this!” Jared insisted. “I’m not crazy.” But he had no idea how to convince Jensen of that. Even to him, it sounded pretty out there. 

Eventually Jensen convinced Jared to eat some dinner and go to bed, but he lay awake all night in the silent house, waiting for something to happen.

***

Jared thought maybe the house knew that he was on to it and watching with a sharp eye for any more strangeness that he could point out to Jensen, because things were stubbornly normal for the rest of the week. He almost started to think that he’d imagined the whole thing. Nothing had happened that didn’t have a perfectly logical explanation, and they had no proof that their home was even the one which had been the site of the girl’s death. Jared felt pretty embarrassed by how much he’d overreacted, but Jensen seemed to have put it out of his mind so Jared tried to do the same.

On Saturday their renovations began in earnest. They’d already pulled up as much of the old tile as they could, but with the arrival of the weekend it was time to rip out the toilet and sink and the remaining tiles around them. A plumber was coming on Monday to help them install the new sink and toilet, and before then they needed to lay new tiles and wash the walls down so they could be painted.

Jared still felt slightly uneasy about working in the bathroom, but he tried not to let on that it bothered him. It was probably obvious that he was jumpier than usual – when Jensen dropped a tile while Jared wasn’t expecting it, the loud crack made him jolt. When Jensen cursed, Jared spun around, demanding, “What is it? What?”

“Nothing,” Jensen said irritably, looking at Jared like he’d lost his mind. “I just got grout all over myself, that’s all.”

Jared could see where Jensen had spilled the grout all over his pants. “Sucks to be you,” he said, trying to relax enough to find it funny.

Later on, Jensen filled a bucket with offcuts of tile to take to the trash and left Jared to sweep the new floor. He went around the floor meticulously, getting into every corner and clearing out all the dust. 

Jared needed to find the dustpan, but there was so much junk in the room that it was difficult to spot. He looked in the mirror; it showed the edge of the bathtub with junk piled up against it, and the back wall. It was too high off the ground to show the floor, but the dustpan was on top of the toilet cistern for some reason. Jared grabbed it.

He turned back to start sweeping up, and the mirror caught his eye again. No, it was movement, movement had caught his eye. Movement of a reflection in the mirror. The reflection of a hand.

It was reaching up out of the bathtub. Jared looked rapidly from the mirror to the empty bathtub, and back again, his breathing becoming fast and shallow. He remembered reading _“hidden in the downstairs bathroom of their home for almost two days until she died....”_ Then the hand reached out towards him.

Jensen came running at the sound of Jared’s bloodcurdling scream, and met him in the hallway. “What is it?” Jensen asked, grabbing his shoulders. “Are you hurt? Are you okay? What happened?”

Jared gulped for breath and realised that he couldn’t tell Jensen what he’d seen. Jensen already thought he was sort of nuts, and this wouldn’t help. Jared was already doubting what had happened. Maybe he only thought he’d seen a hand. He was really wound up, he might have imagined it. He knew nothing had been in the bathroom, after all. Only in the mirror, and a mirror couldn’t reflect something that wasn’t there. He must not have seen it.

“Nothing happened,” Jared said. “I just thought I saw... something.”

“What, like a spider?” Jensen asked doubtfully. 

“Yeah, like that.”

***

On Monday the plumber got the new toilet and sink connected, and helped close off the pipes where the vanity had originally stood. He left after agreeing to come back the following Monday to install the pipes for the new shower and get the new bath connected.

“Have you thought about putting in a new heating system?” the plumber asked on his way out. “It gets pretty cold in there.”

Jared showed him to the door and then stood alone in the house, shivering and looking over his shoulder. He needed to get out of there.

Over the next week, Jared used every excuse to not be in the house by himself. He told Jensen, and himself, that he was just learning his way around their new town, but deep down he knew the truth. He still had to sleep in the house, though, and Jensen in the bed beside him wasn’t much comfort when he obliviously slept through snatches of music and the banging sounds coming from the bathroom.

The worst came on Thursday night when Jared woke up needing to pee but afraid to get out of bed. The house was quiet, but he was worried about what might happen if he left the bedroom, which felt like something of a safe haven to Jared. With the downstairs bathroom out of commission, they’d been using the one upstairs, which suited Jared fine, but he’d still have to walk past the downstairs bathroom to get to the stairs.

Jared checked his digital clock, hoping that it was almost morning, but to his annoyance it was only a quarter to two. He wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep if he didn’t relieve himself, he’d just lie awake in bed jumping at every little sound. It was ridiculous.

Jared tossed the covers back and stood up, pausing when his feet touched the floor and again when he reached the door, just to check that nothing was waiting for him. He walked down the hallway inch by inch. He’d put the light on, but that didn’t make the walk any less anxiety-provoking.

As he reached the downstairs bathroom, the door, slightly ajar, swung towards him with a creak. Jared scrambled backwards, heart pounding, then relaxed when it swung back the other way. It had to be a draft from the window, but Jared was damned if he was going to go in there and close it. He darted past the door and climbed the staircase, torn between his fear of looking back and his fear of not looking.

Upstairs, Jared flipped up the toilet seat, but had a hard time actually using it. The toilet sat opposite the mirror, and he didn’t want to put his back to the mirror, but he couldn’t exactly pee without looking unless he wanted to get it all over the floor. Eventually he lowered the toilet seat and pissed sitting down, which wasn’t exactly his idea of a great time, but it was the only way he could deal. 

It was stupid. Nothing had ever even happened in the upstairs bathroom, but the damn house had him so jumpy that everything seemed scary. Even when he left the bathroom, Jared didn’t feel quite right having the mirror behind him. He hurried down the stairs as though something was following him.

The downstairs bathroom door was closed. Shut all the way, not just resting against the door jamb. Jared hadn’t heard it close. He might not have, of course, being all the way upstairs, but the skin on his back was crawling nonetheless. He couldn’t even make himself walk past it in the hallway; he went through the kitchen and back to his bedroom that way instead.

In the clear light of day, of course Jared could see how ridiculous he was being. But that didn’t help. Knowing he was losing his mind didn’t make it stop; it didn’t make him feel better. It didn’t make him any happier. It was time to talk to Jensen.

Jared was pretty sure that what he had to say wasn’t going to be well received at all, but he needed to say it anyway. He grabbed Jensen before dinner that evening.

“We have to talk,” he said.

“Shit,” said Jensen, looking worried. “That sounds serious.”

Jared sat with him at the dining table and started talking, not bothering to hold back. “I hate this house, Jensen.”

“You love this house,” Jensen said, looking confused.

“No, I _loved_ this house,” Jared corrected. “Past tense. But I hate living here. Maybe it’s stupid, but weird things keep happening and it’s really freaking me out. I don’t want to live here.”

“What are you saying?” Jensen asked. He still sounded confused, but there was a growing touch of irritation in his voice as the penny dropped. “You can’t mean you want to move again.”

“Yeah, I do.”

“But Jared! We just moved in!” Jensen cried. “We have a mortgage now. I don’t think we can afford it.”

“But... sure we can,” Jared insisted. “If we sell this house... maybe we can get someplace smaller, or an apartment like we planned originally.”

Jensen was already shaking his head. “Think about it,” he insisted. “We’d still have to pay off the mortgage, which, yeah, the sale of the house should cover, but moving here was expensive too, and we just committed a whole heap of money to renovating the bathroom...”

“But your new job pays so much more. We can just save up...”

“What, another home loan deposit? Jared, that would take months, at least. And we’d still lose a stack of money.”

Jared sighed as the reality of the situation closed in. Jensen thought he was being ridiculous, but Jensen also had a good head for money. If he said they couldn’t afford it, it was probably true.

“Look, I know it’s not what you want to hear,” Jensen said gently. “But maybe you just need to give this place a chance. I bet if you let yourself get used to it, you’ll end up really liking it.”

“Maybe,” Jared agreed, but he didn’t really mean it.

***

If they couldn’t move, Jared was just going to have to learn to deal with it. He figured it was time to toughen up. No more making excuses to avoid the house, and no more jumping at shadows. He was a grown adult, and ghosts were not real.

He tried different things to make the house feel less creepy. He’d put the lights on as soon as the daylight started to disappear. He’d always have music or the TV running while he was at home to make the house feel less empty, even if it meant watching Jerry Springer. He always closed doors behind him so that they wouldn’t slam and startle him, and he never, ever, went into the downstairs bathroom if he could possibly avoid it.

It sort of seemed to work. Jared felt less jumpy; he could tolerate the occasional sudden noise without screaming or panicking. As the week drew to a close, he congratulated himself on conquering his irrational fears and let himself relax on the sofa with a beer in one hand and a sitcom on the TV.

As he sat there, Jared became aware of a touch on his shoulder. He shifted, but it didn’t go away. It seemed to move up towards his neck. Some ghostly presence was sitting next to him on the sofa and touching him, possibly in preparation for crushing his throat. Jared scuttled sideways and, although he was afraid to look, he turned his head to the side.

From the corner of his eye, Jared saw something dark and many-legged sitting on his shoulder. He yelped and swatted at it with his hand; the spider fell to the floor and scuttled under the couch. Jared tugged off one shoe and held it in the air as he pulled the couch out with his other hand. “Come out here and fight, you coward!” he bellowed. Then he realised how ridiculous he sounded and continued hunting for the spider in embarrassed silence.

When Jensen arrived home a little later, he thought the story sounded simply hilarious.

***

The next day, they removed the bathtub. Unfortunately, it was one occasion when Jared couldn’t get out of going into the bathroom. They had to chip away the tiles surrounding the bath, slowly and painstakingly. They had to remove the faucets and disconnect the drain, which was also a lengthy process – neither of them knew much about plumbing, so they had to look everything up.

Once the tub was, theoretically, loose, they still had to get it out of the house. They laid drop sheets through the hall and Jared wheeled the trolley in, but first they had to get the tub out and standing on its end. They each took an end and started to pull it out, inch by inch.

It didn’t come away at first. Jared knew it was mad, but it almost felt like the bath didn’t want to go. Jensen grabbed the chisel again and chipped away remnants of mortar, and they tried again. The bath slid out with a low groan, like a death rattle. Jared shook his head and tried to stop thinking such bizarre, morbid thoughts.

They got the bathtub out through the back door and took it around to the skip they’d hired for the duration of the renovation. They heaved it up and into the skip and exchanged a happy, exhausted, high-five.

“Good riddance,” Jared said emphatically.

“Yeah,” Jensen said, giving him a funny look. “It’s going to be so much better once it’s finished.”

“Yeah, it really will be.”

***

Jared didn’t let himself explicitly hope that the creepiness of the house would diminish once the bath was gone, but if pushed he might have admitted that the thought had crossed his mind. With every loud noise that came from the bathroom, Jared firmly reminded himself that Jensen was still working in there. It was harder to explain the snatches of lyrics that Jared was beginning to recognise, but he considered a few possibilities. Maybe he was hearing things, or Jensen was playing the song to freak him out. Or maybe it was just a coincidence.

That evening, though, when they were eating dinner, Jared got up to get the mustard out of the fridge. He went into the kitchen and looked through the doorway. He didn’t consciously think about doing it, he just glanced to the right and looked across the hallway to the bathroom. The sun was setting on that side of the house, and a dim orange glow shone through the bathroom door onto the tiles. The stairs and the laundry were in shadow, but the light was on in the kitchen and the white, electric light nearly met the orange in the middle of the floor. It was like a little illuminated path through the hallway, and Jared let his eyes follow it from the bathroom back to the archway that opened into the kitchen. He raised his eyes up.

Someone was looking at him.

Jared gasped and dropped the mustard; the jar smashed on the floor but he barely noticed. Someone was looking around the edge of the door frame. Thick brown hair lay over her forehead and her eyes were wide and dark. She stared at him, and then she stepped back from the doorway and Jared lost sight of her. 

Jared would have yelled if he’d had the breath to do it with. His heart pounded. He wondered who she was and how she’d got into the house, but even as he thought about it he realise that didn’t make sense. She hadn’t made any sound. Jensen was home, and he hadn’t noticed her. One of them should have heard the door open. She could only have gone out the back door without Jared seeing her, but it was locked, and yet he was sure that if he went looking, all trace of her would be gone. Not that he was about to go after her. 

“Jensen,” Jared croaked out.

***

“I _saw_ her, and I _didn’t_ imagine it! She was _there!_ ”

Jensen opened his mouth to say something else logical and reasonable, and Jared just couldn’t take it if he did that. “I want to move,” he said. “I know you said we can’t afford it, but I don’t care. I’ll get another job if I have to. Hell, I’ll work three jobs if that’s what it takes.”

Jensen studied Jared’s face carefully. “You’re really serious about this, aren’t you?” he asked.

“ _Yes_!” Jared cried.

“Okay,” Jensen said. “Okay. If it’s really that important to you, and I guess it is, then... we should both save up, get enough money together so we can move somewhere else.”

It was an immense relief to Jared to finally have Jensen’s agreement. “It is that important,” he said. “Thanks, Jensen.”

It was good to have something to focus on, but it wasn’t an immediate solution. It was going to take time for them to save up enough to move again, and in the meantime they had no choice but to continue living in the house. 

The plumber came out on Monday like they’d already planned, because it was too late to cancel and if they wanted to sell the house it would be much easier with a functional bathroom. Jared stayed nearby for a little while to answer some of the plumber’s questions about how they wanted the new bath placed, but he left as soon as he could find an excuse and went to vacuum the living room and bedroom, taking much longer over the task than it really needed.

He was just putting the vacuum cleaner away in the laundry when he heard footsteps in the hallway. It had been quiet in the bathroom when he’d finished cleaning, so he’d assumed the plumber was nearly finished. “Is it done?” he called.

There was no answer. Jared left the laundry and came out into the hallway, where the plumber was standing and looking his way.

“Is the bath connected?” Jared asked uncertainly. Something wasn’t quite right about the plumber’s expression. His face was slack, his eyes a little unfocused. His hands were empty and he didn’t fidget – in fact, he was almost disturbingly still.

“Are you okay?” Jared asked. The plumber didn’t answer. His eyes narrowed and he leaned forward, towards Jared. “Um... is something wrong?”

The plumber’s mouth twisted and he bared his teeth in a snarl. He put his hands up threateningly, and Jared stepped backwards. He felt the back door behind him and knew he couldn’t go any further. The plumber stepped closer and Jared put both hands against the other man’s chest, shoving him back forcefully.

The plumber stumbled and caught the stair railing to balance himself. “What...?” he asked, looking around and shaking his head. “What just...?”

Jared watched closely, wondering if anything else strange was going to happen. When it didn’t, he asked, “Is the drain connected yet?”

The plumber started a little, like he’d forgotten Jared was there. “Uh...” He glanced back into the bathroom. “There’s a bit more to do,” he said, and went back to work. With his heart still beating hard, Jared watched from the other side of the hallway to make sure that nothing else happened.

***

Thirty minutes later Jared paid the plumber and showed him out. He stood on the front porch and looked doubtfully back through the front door.

What had happened to the plumber? He hadn’t seemed aware of what he was doing. It belatedly occurred to Jared that he might have had some kind of medical issue, a stroke or something. At the time he hadn’t even considered that possibility, he’d instantly assumed it was somehow related to the malevolent spirit in the house. The plumber’s behaviour had been threatening enough that it had seemed a logical conclusion to draw. For a certain value of logic, anyway.

Once again, Jared waited outside until Jensen got home from work. Jensen pulled up and got out of his car with a tense, worried expression. “Everything okay?” he asked.

“I... yeah. I’m fine.” Jared wanted to tell Jensen what had happened, but he didn’t want to deal with Jensen’s scepticism. He didn’t want to listen to Jensen telling him that he was stressed and imagining things, but it had been a while since the plumber had left and the memory of what had happened, the visceral terror and uneasiness of it, was already fading. Jared wasn’t sure he could convince Jensen he was telling the truth, he wasn’t even sure that Jensen wouldn’t manage to convince him he was wrong.

Inside, Jensen raved about the bathroom and talked happily about his day, but it was the sort of forced cheerfulness that Jared could see through easily. Jensen was just trying to convince him that things were fine, or, if that failed, convince him to pretend that they were. Jared was in no mood to go along with that, however, and he was withdrawn and sour all evening.

They had pasta for dinner and an apple pie for dessert. Jensen, who’d grown steadily quieter as the night wore on, got up to cut himself a second slice while Jared wiped down the table. The silence was broken only by the clatter of plates being stacked until Jensen let out a pained yelp.

“Fuck!” he cried, his voice a mix of pain and fear. 

Jared dropped the cloth instantly and went to him, asking “What is it?” even as he took in the bloody knife on the counter and Jensen clutching his left hand.

“It cut me!” he said. “Shit. I’m bleeding fucking everywhere.”

The cut must have been deep, because droplets of blood had splattered the counter and the cupboard doors, and even now was welling up between his fingers. Jared grabbed a dish towel and pressed it over the cut. “You’ve gotta be more careful,” he said gruffly.

“It wasn’t me.”

“I know, I know, accidents happen,” Jared said.

“No, Jared, you’re not listening,” Jensen snapped. “I didn’t touch the fucking knife. It moved on its own and stabbed into my hand!”

Jared gave Jensen a searching look, gauging his sincerity, then glanced at the knife. Now he was paying attention, he did notice that Jensen was giving it a wide berth, as though he was worried it would move again. 

“I wonder if you need stitches,” Jared said, pulling the towel back slightly to assess how bad it was.

“Did you hear me?” Jensen asked. “The knife slid across the counter _by itself_! That’s not fucking normal!”

Jared’s patience snapped. “Don’t you think I know that?” he demanded. “What do you think I’ve been telling you this whole time, Jensen? You’ve been treating me like I’m crazy or making shit up, and as soon as something happens to you, you want me to act like it’s a big deal? Well, welcome to my world!”

Jensen looked pretty guilty at that. “I didn’t think, Jared,” he said, shamefaced. “I’m sorry.”

Jared kicked him in the ankle, but too late. The knife on the bench trembled, and Jensen leaped backwards. Thinking quickly, Jared reached out and put his hand down over the handle. Maybe he was stronger than whatever was trying to move the knife, or maybe it was just tired of toying with them, but the knife stilled. Jared glared at Jensen, who gulped.

“I’m-” Jensen began, then cut himself short. “You know,” he finished weakly. Jared nodded.

“Do you think you need stitches?” he asked, reaching out for Jensen’s hand again. As he moved the towel away blood welled up again. “It is bleeding pretty heavily.”

“Yeah,” Jensen said faintly. “I feel a bit dizzy. Need to sit down.” But there were no chairs in the kitchen, so he just leaned heavily on the counter. “Maybe we should go to the emergency room. And, you know, away. From here.”

Jared rolled his eyes at Jensen. “Yeah,” he said. “Great idea.”

***

The hospital was busy and there was a long wait. As they sat in the waiting room, Jared and Jensen had a whispered discussion about what had happened.

“I mean, it could have been vibrations from traffic in the street, or even, um... magnetism!” Jensen speculated. “Something that makes _sense_!”

Jared groaned. “No, Jensen, damn it!” he snapped. “Don’t do that! Don’t convince yourself it was just your imagination. I’ve been dealing with this on my own for weeks, and now you’ve finally seen what’s happening with your own eyes. I need you to be in this with me.”

Jensen frowned but didn’t argue. “It’s just so bizarre,” he complained. “This stuff doesn’t really exist. It doesn’t really happen. What are we supposed to do now, call the Ghostbusters or something?”

“I don’t know, maybe?” Jared wondered. “I mean, there has to be someone out there who knows about this stuff. Someone who can help us.”

“You want us to hire an exorcist?”

“Well, would it be cheaper than moving again?” Jared challenged. Jensen didn’t answer. “And I was thinking that maybe we should find out a bit more about what’s going on, do some research. Maybe we can talk to the people who rented the house before we moved in, see how they dealt with it. Maybe if we can understand what’s happening a bit better...” He trailed off. He wasn’t sure it would help to investigate what had happened in the house, but it couldn’t hurt.

“Ackles?” called a nurse from the desk, and Jensen got up. “We can figure this out tomorrow,” he said, and went to get his hand stitched up.

***

The bad part about escaping the house for a few hours was having to go back. It was shortly after midnight when they got home, and it was a dark night. Jared hesitated in the driver’s seat of the car, reluctant to get out, and when he glanced over at Jensen he didn’t seem any more eager to go inside.

They had to in the end, though. It was going to be hard enough getting up in the morning as it was. They went inside, stepping quietly and turning on every light switch they passed. Jensen left the hallway light on and the bedroom door ajar, and Jared didn’t say anything about it. He still slept poorly that night.

The next day before work, Jared checked the spot on the top of the fridge where they’d been collecting all the mail that had arrived at the house which wasn’t addressed to them. They’d been putting ‘return to sender’ on the mail and posting it back every couple of weeks, but there were two letters still there addressed to an Anton Ricks. Jared put the letters in his laptop case and took it with him when he left.

When he finished work that day, Jared headed to the library. He started by sending out a heap of job applications, and then started researching the house. Anton Ricks, as far as he could tell, was a bank manager at a local branch. Jared was able to organise a meeting with him for Thursday afternoon.

From Katie, the girl over the road, he’d been able to get the phone number of her friend’s family. He sat on the bench just outside the library to make the call. 

“Hi, my name’s Jared, and I’m looking for the Landing family who used to live in Canning Street?”

There was a long silence on the other end. “This is Fiona Landing. What’s this about?” the woman asked eventually.

Jared instantly forgot what he’d planned to say next. “Um, hi!” he said. “Hello. It’s... I’m a friend of Katie’s.”

“ _You’re_ a friend of Katie’s?” the woman asked suspiciously.

“No, I mean... I’m her neighbour. I live across the road? She told me you lived in our house a few years ago...” He trailed off, but Mrs Lading didn’t answer so after a minute he added, “I’ve got some questions about the house.”

“Like what?”

Jared wasn’t sure what to ask that wouldn’t put Fiona off completely. “Did you ever notice anything strange about it?” he asked, for lack of anything better.

“Strange like how?”

“Like... weird noises. Banging, late at night, or music, or a voice...”

Fiona blew out a long breath. “I’ve been trying to forget about it,” she said at last. “I’d hear crying late at night, sometimes. Things would fall off shelves, sometimes the lights went on and off by themselves. It was always just so... creepy. Uncomfortable.”

“I saw something in the bathroom mirror once,” Jared said. “A hand. And once I think... I think I saw a face.”

“That’s... I never saw anything like that,” Fiona said. “I think I would have broken my lease if I had. How long have you lived there?”

“About a month. How long did you...”

“Almost a year. I remember nearly every week something strange would happen.”

Jared tried not to laugh. Nearly every week? He could barely remember a day going by that something strange and terrifying didn’t happen. “Last night, a knife slid across the bench by itself and cut my partner’s hand,” he whispered. “I’m getting really scared.”

“It wasn’t like that when I lived there,” Fiona said after a moment. “Maybe you can get out of your lease – you should call your property manager.”

“We’re not renting the house, we bought it.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.” Jared sighed. “Look, thanks for your time. I’d better go.”

“Okay,” Fiona said, sounding troubled. “Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

“I will.”

***

When he got home, Jared learned that Jensen had been doing some research of his own.

“A psychic?” he asked doubtfully. “What kind of psychic has an ad in the yellow pages?”

“Well, where else would they put one?” Jensen snapped. “These three also have websites. The first one has testimonials, but they all sound a little bit, well... fake.”

“Yeah,” Jared said, “because they’re _psychics_.”

“You know, this was your idea first,” Jensen retorted. 

“You’re right,” Jared said, feeling rather guilty. “Go on.”

“The second one says that she specialises in communication with the dead, which could be useful. The third website was very basic, not much information on it. I think we should give this second one a try, yeah?”

“Yeah?”

So they grabbed the phone and Jared made the call. It rang a couple of times and then went through to voicemail. “Hi, you’ve reached Lady Esmerelda. I’m not able to take your call now, but leave a message and I’ll call you back.”

Jared glanced at Jensen who shrugged at him. The phone beeped, and Jared stammered, “Uh, hi – hi, this is Jared Padalecki. I’m looking for someone who can help with a – a haunted house? So, uh, call back on this number, I guess.” 

“If she’s so psychic,” Jensen said once Jared had hung up, “why do we have to call her? Why doesn’t she know to call us?”

Jared rolled his eyes. “Yeah, that’s an original sentiment,” he said sarcastically.

“Well, sor – ow!” Jensen glared at him, and Jared glared straight back, slowly lifting his foot off Jensen’s. 

“I’m meeting Anton Ricks tomorrow,” Jared said, “so maybe he can tell me something useful for when she calls back.”

***

“Oh, yeah, I remember Canning Street.” Anton waved Jared to a seat in his office and pushed some folders out of his way. “Nice little house. I had to move once I got married, though, the little woman wanted some place a bit bigger.” He grinned hugely at Jared, who gave a small smile in return.

“So you never noticed anything... strange about the house?” Jared asked. 

“Well, I had a raccoon living in the back yard for about four months, but Animal Control took care of it.”

“I meant more like things you couldn’t understand. Lights turning on and off by themselves, or noises when you were the only one home.”

Anton gave him an odd look. “Look, Jake... can I call you Jake?”

“It’s Jared, actually.”

“Jake, I’m not sure what you’re getting at, but it was just a house. The strangest thing that ever happened there was my little brother locked himself in the bathroom one day and couldn’t get out, but to tell you the truth, he’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer, know what I mean?”

“Right,” Jared said slowly. “Well. I’m sorry to have wasted your time.”

Jared went home – reluctantly – and changed into old clothes so he could do some weeding. He had a vague idea in mind of tidying up the backyard so that it would look more appealing to buyers. Jared went through the hallway to the back door and paused opposite the bathroom. He imagined being trapped in there, unable to get the door open, and shuddered.

He was still in the yard when he heard Jensen pull into the driveway. He ran to the gate and waved. “Hey, Jensen!” he said. “Stay there, I’ll move my car out so you can park in front of me.” It had only taken one incident of Jared needing to wake Jensen up at half-past six before they’d started moving their cars around in the afternoons. Jared hurried inside to find his car keys. They weren’t on the hook by the door where they were usually kept. Puzzled, Jared checked the dresser in the bedroom and inside the pocket of his work pants, even though he usually never put anything in there. He hadn’t been anywhere else in the house since coming home; he’d come inside, got changed, and gone straight to the yard. He wandered up and down the hall to check whether he’d somehow dropped the keys on the floor, but they were nowhere in sight.

“Jared?” Jensen called from the front door. “What’s taking so long?”

“I can’t find my fucking keys!” Jared snapped, beginning to feel upset. “I’m sure I put them on the hook, but they’re not there.”

“It’s okay,” Jensen said soothingly, “they’ll turn up. Why don’t we just get dinner and we can look for the keys later?”

Jared didn’t really feel like it; he wanted to find his keys _now_ , damn it, but he didn’t know where to start looking. “Fine,” he said, “but I bet you won’t be this laid back about it when you have to drive me to work tomorrow at six-thirty.”

“It’s only, like, four blocks, you could walk,” Jensen said. Jared glared at him, but it didn’t have much effect.

Later on, when Jensen was returning the ice cream to the freezer after dishing up the pie they were having for desert, they both heard a definite clink. “What’s this?” Jensen asked, reaching in. “Jared!” he exclaimed, “care to explain why you put your car keys in the freezer?” He held them up and shook them; Jared snatched the keys from his hand. They were icy cold to the touch. 

“I didn’t!” Jared said indignantly.

“It’s okay, Jared, it’s normal to get a little absentminded in your old age. It happens to the best of us.”

“Listen to me, you jerk, I didn’t leave them in there!” Jared took a deep breath. “I haven’t been anywhere near the freezer all day. I didn’t even go into the kitchen before you got home. How could I have left these in there?” He rattled the keys in Jensen’s face and Jensen batted his hand away.

“Weird,” Jensen said, but Jared could tell he still believed he’d done it and then forgotten about it.

“She put them in there,” Jared muttered. Jensen sighed.

“She’s one wild ghost, trying to steal your Honda Civic for a joyride,” Jensen agreed. Jared rolled his eyes and ignored him.

That night, in his sleep, Jared dreamed that he was in the bathroom and the door was stuck. He couldn’t get it to open, try as he might. The door handle turned freely but the door still wouldn’t budge, and although he shoved and pulled as hard as he could, it was as immovable as stone. 

Nothing happened while he was in there. No monsters came out of the woodwork to scare him, there were no noises and no writing on the mirror, but the fear hung heavily on him the entire time. Something _could_ happen at any moment, and there was no escape.

Jared pounded on the door with his fist. “Jensen!” he yelled. “Jensen! Help!”

“Just a minute,” Jensen called back. Jared waited, but no help came.

“Jensen!” he yelled again.

“I’ll be right there!”

“Jensen, come get me out of here!”

“Okay, okay, hold your horses!”

“JENSEN!”

Jared jerked awake, every limb trembling, staring around the dark bedroom with huge eyes. There were shadows in odd corners, but he could identify them all with a little thought. The clothes hamper stood against the far wall, and Jensen had hung his suit for the next day on a hanger on the outside of the closet door. The shape by the door was just the reflection of the moon on the frame of a picture hanging there. The room was empty except for him and Jensen.

Jared really needed to pee, but he could hear music playing and a voice crying softly, and no power on earth could have persuaded him to get out of the bed.

***

It might have been irrational paranoia, but Jared had decided that he couldn’t be too careful, and so he always left the house when he wanted to research it. It meant that he was finding a lot of cafes and malls that offered free wifi, which was a bonus.

He’d got about as far as he could researching the house’s previous tenants, but on a whim Jared typed ‘Trotter murder’ into the Google search bar. 

‘Brian Trotter killed in prison’ was one of the first results. Jared read the article and learned that Trotter had been attacked in prison and died from stab wounds to the chest and neck. Further searching revealed that his wife Rachel had been granted parole at the end of the previous year.

Jared read that article twice, thinking hard. It gave no hint about whether she’d remained in the area or moved somewhere else – but she’d have to still live in town, wouldn’t she? Jared wasn’t sure but he thought there were rules like that for parolees. He searched the white pages and found only one result with the correct initial. He copied the address and put it in his wallet for safekeeping, not sure if he would ever use it but wanting to have the option.

It was time to go home after that. They were expecting Lady Esmerelda that evening.

Jensen was sitting on the couch when Jared arrived home, but the TV wasn’t on, and although dusk was setting in, he hadn’t turned on any lights. Jared took care of that immediately, switching lights on in the hallway, living room and kitchen.

“Are you alright there, just staring off into space?” Jared asked Jensen. Jensen turned his head towards Jared but didn’t say anything. Jared felt suddenly uneasy. “Jensen?”

Jensen didn’t respond. Didn’t answer, but more than that, he showed no awareness that Jared had spoken at all.

“Jensen?” Jared repeated, his throat going dry.

Jensen’s eyes were locked on his. He didn’t even seem to be blinking. He was staring at Jared like he could see through his skull and read his thoughts. Not completely by coincidence, Jared’s thoughts at that moment turned to the knife block behind him on the kitchen counter. It was almost within arm’s reach. He hoped Jensen wasn’t actually reading his thoughts, and that that was just a flight of fancy on his part. 

Jared gulped and stepped back towards the doorway. Jensen’s head turned to follow his movements, but he didn’t stand up. Jared hesitated at the edge of the room, not sure whether it would be worse to keep watching Jensen do... whatever he was doing, or to have Jensen somewhere Jared couldn’t see him.

“Jensen?” Jared asked again, pleading this time. Jensen was as still as stone. Jared whimpered and backed into the hall. Like ripping off a band-aid, he told himself. Everything’s going to be okay.

He turned around and came face to face with the bathroom door. He glared at the door as though it was the focal point of every shitty thing that had happened since they’d moved in. Impulsively, he lashed out with a foot and kicked at the bottom panel of the door. His boot struck the wood with a loud thud, and some of the paint cracked off. At the same time, the doorbell rang. Jared spun around, startled, and Jensen appeared from the living room.

Jensen opened the front door. “Hi,” he said. “You must be Lady Esmerelda. Come in.” His voice sounded normal. There was nothing off about his movements. Jared watched closely for any signs that something was wrong.

“Jared’s around somewhere,” Jensen said. He turned around. “Oh, there you are, Jared! I wondered where you’d gone. This is Lady Esmerelda.” He smiled, and it looked just like every other time Jensen had ever smiled. Was he unaware of what had just happened? Jared tried to tear his attention away from Jensen and look at the clairvoyant. Now that she was here, she might be able to help.

Lady Esmerelda was a plump middle-aged woman with shoulder length reddish-brown hair. She wore a light blue dress over dark blue leggings, and a number of long chains hung around her neck, all with various symbols hanging from them. Jared spotted a cross and a pentagram, and others he didn’t recognise, like a circle with a line through it inside a triangle.

“When did the first incident happen?”

“The day we moved in, a couple of months ago,” said Jared. “We were bringing in all our furniture, and I said... something, and then the bedroom door slammed in my face. By itself.”

“Hmm,” said Lady Esmerelda, nodding but looking confused. Jared sighed.

“The... spirit, or whatever, doesn’t like it when people, um, apologise? It gets angry.”

“Oh, I see. So if someone says that they’re sorry for something...” 

Jared flinched and looked around fearfully, but nothing happened. The room was still, and silent. Eerily so, maybe. Especially considering that he’d really been expecting some sort of reaction.

“What is the history of the house?” asked Lady Esmerelda. “I’m assuming that you’ve researched it.”

“A young girl was murdered here about five years ago. Her parents... it was her parents, and they both went to prison. The father was killed a couple of years ago and the mother was paroled last year.”

“Hmmm.” Lady Esmerelda considered that. “In cases like this, spirits often become angry that they haven’t received justice. Her mother’s release from prison could have provoked her.”

“Maybe,” Jensen said doubtfully.

“I don’t know,” Jared said. “I’ve talked to some of the people who lived in the house before we did, and they both noticed strange things happening too. Well, sort of,” he amended, remembering Anton’s obliviousness.

“It’s hard to say,” said Lady Esmerelda. “Have the strange occurrences escalated over time?”

“Yes,” Jared said emphatically while Jensen nodded. “Especially after we renovated the bathroom.”

“The bathroom. Is that significant?” she asked.

“It’s where she died.”

“Well, let’s go have a look, then.”

So they trooped down to the bathroom, where Jensen showed Lady Esmerelda inside while Jared hovered in the hallway, feeling foolish but reluctant to go through the door.

“A few times I noticed words written in the steam on the shower screen and mirror,” said Jared, pointing. “And we hear strange noises coming from this room a lot. Banging, or a voice calling for help. And once I saw a hand reflected in the mirror, but no one was there.”

Lady Esmerelda stood in the middle of the little room and slowly turned around. “There’s a dark energy in this room,” she said in a low voice. “I sense that this part of the house was central to that poor girl’s death.” She looked sad for a moment, then became more businesslike. “What we need to do is communicate with this spirit and encourage her to move on to the next realm.”

Jared glanced at Jensen. “Okay,” he said. “How do we do that?”

Lady Esmerelda opened the large canvas bag she’d been carrying and pulled out two thick white candles and a lighter. “Would you rather I put these on saucers?” she asked.

“I’ll get some,” Jared volunteered. He darted to the kitchen and returned quickly. When he came back, Lady Esmeralda was drawing on the tile floor with chalk.

“It’ll wipe right off,” she said cheerfully. “Now, you’ll need to come in here, Jared.”

“Okay,” Jared said, but he hesitated outside the door for several seconds before he could make himself step through. He was pretty sure it was just his imagination telling him that there was a noticeable chill inside the room, but he shivered anyway. 

“We need to hold hands and stand in a circle,” Lady Esmerelda said. “Jared, you face east, and Jensen, you face west.” She positioned Jared with his back to the mirror – which did not thrill him in any way – and Jensen opposite him. “I’ll face south. We need to focus all our attention on the south side of the circle to provide the spirit with a point through which to communicate.” 

That sounded like nonsense to Jared, but what did he know? He took Lady Esmerelda’s hand, and reached across the circle towards Jensen with his other hand.

“No,” said Lady Esmerelda, “don’t close the circle, we need to allow the spirit a way in.”

So Jared kept his right hand down by his side and waited. Lady Esmerelda dropped her chin down onto her chest. “We are calling the spirit that haunts this place,” she said in a deep, melodious voice. She tilted her head back. “We call on that spirit to come forth and make itself known.” She drew in a deep breath, so loudly that Jared almost jumped. He glanced across at Jensen but he was watching the psychic with an incredulous expression on his face.

Lady Esmerelda breathed out, just as loudly. “Reveal yourself to us, spirit!” she cried out, and at that moment, one of the candles she had lit and set on the edge of the bath guttered and went out. Jared stared and the glanced at Jensen, who was looking a little shaken himself.

Lady Esmerelda spoke again, but her voice had changed. “Release me from this place,” she whispered in a high, quavering voice. “Let me be gone.”

“What is keeping you here, child?” she asked in her own voice, speaking gently.

“I cannot rest until justice is done to the ones who wronged me,” answered the high pitched voice coming from Lady Esmerelda’s lips.

“Justice has been done, my child,” Lady Esmerelda answered. “The people who hurt you were arrested and sentenced. Your father is dead. Move on from here, and know that you are beyond their reach now.”

Lady Esmerelda took another deep breath and tilted her head to the side. The doors of the cabinet behind Jared flew open, one of them hitting his leg and the other slamming into the bath. Jared yelped and stepped out of the way, and Lady Esmerelda’s eyes became huge. “I bid you to go forward to the next realm, where you will be free of the hurts from this one!” she cried out, her voice no longer quite so melodious. “Go from this place!”

Lady Esmerelda was gripping his hand so tightly that Jared winced. She breathed in and drew herself up to her full height. “Thank you for freeing me,” she said quickly in her high-pitched voice. The second candle went out.

Lady Esmerelda breathed in and out deeply once more, blinked slowly, and let go of Jared and Jensen’s hands. “Well,” she said, in her normal voice, “I think that’s all taken care of.”

Jared exchanged a glance with Jensen. “You do?” he asked.

She nodded. “Yes, I don’t think you’ll be seeing any more of her.” She stepped out into the hallway and Jared followed her quickly. “Most spirits just want someone to listen to them. You give them what they need, and it releases their ties to this world. Now, I can only take cash, so...”

“That’s right, I have it,” Jensen said quickly, and went to get the money.

Lady Esmerelda collected her candles and smiled at Jared. “You have a lovely home,” she said.

“Thanks. Hopefully it will be even better now,” Jared said.

“I’m sure you’ll be very happy here,” she said, accepting payment from Jensen with thanks. They walked her to the front door, and she paused there with a frown.

“I could have sworn I left my bag here,” she said, looking at the corner between the front door and the bedroom door, which was decidedly empty. Jared glanced around but didn’t see the bag.

“It’s over here,” Jensen said, taking a step into the living room. “Next to the sofa.”

“Ah, thanks!” said Lady Esmerelda, taking the bag. “Well,” she said, pausing in the doorway, “good luck.”

“Thanks for your help,” said Jensen. She nodded and left.

Jensen closed the door and Jared looked at him.

“What?” Jensen asked.

“Do you think it worked?”

“For what we paid her, it fucking better have.”

Jared sighed. “I know what you mean, but... did that seem a little bit...”

“Incredibly fake?” Jensen asked. Jared nodded. “I guess so,” said Jensen, “but you know I never believe in any of this stuff, except apparently ghosts are real now? So how can I say whether it was fake or real?”

Jared wasn’t reassured. “She lost her bag,” he pointed out. “She put it down in one place and it turned up somewhere else.”

“Come on, Jared, she just forgot where she put it. People do stuff like that all the time.”

“Didn’t it seem like she was kind of eager to get out of here?”

“You’re right, that is suspicious!” Jensen said. “I’m definitely never in a hurry to get out of the office after a day’s work. I’d stay there all night if I could.”

Jared gave up. “Okay, have it your way,” he said. “I’m sure everything’s fine.”

“It’s not that I’m so sure it worked,” Jensen said. “I just don’t see what the point is to worrying about it. It either worked or it didn’t. If it didn’t work, we’ll find out.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

***

Although Jared was particularly vigilant all evening, nothing happened that was even remotely out of the ordinary. Jensen nudged him in the side as they were going to bed and said, “See? Worrying about nothing.”

The house was just as quiet and normal when Jared woke up in the morning. He left for work, knowing that he should feel relieved, but instead a heavy weight of dread had settled over him and refused to budge. 

He went home afterwards, because continuing to avoid the house would have been really hard to explain. He made dinner, meatloaf with steamed vegetables. Over the noise he made chopping vegetables and wrestling the loaf tin out of the cupboard, it was impossible to tell whether or not he was imagining the occasional thump or bang that made him jump. He froze in the middle of putting the meatloaf in the oven, sure that for a second he’d heard a fragment of music, but as soon as he quietened it was gone.

“What’s the occasion?” Jensen asked when he got home to find dinner already prepared and served.

“I’ve been thinking,” Jared said, waving Jensen over to the table. “After dinner, there’s something I’d like to go check out. You could come with me too, if you want.”

“Okay,” Jensen said, sounding a little confused. “What is this, like a club or something?”

“No. Don’t freak out, okay? But I did some research and I learned that the girl’s mother, the one who... you know, she still lives in town. Not all that far from here. I think I want to go talk to her.”

Jensen immediately did what Jared had asked him not to do, and freaked out. “No, Jared, are you nuts? First of all, this woman is probably someone you don’t want to mess with. She just got out of prison, for God’s sake, and she’s not going to want you hanging around being nosy. Secondly, I thought this was all settled now? Why are you still obsessing over it? Nothing’s happened, has it?”

“No,” Jared said defensively, “I just want to be sure...”

“Sure of what? That she’s a terrible person? That something awful happened in this house?” Jensen snapped. “The ghost is gone. Digging up all the grisly details isn’t going to put your mind at ease, it’s just going to make you...”

“Make me what?” Jared asked when Jensen went quiet. Jensen’s eyes slid away from his, and Jared was suddenly pissed off. “Make me keep imagining weird things happening, that’s what you were going to say, wasn’t it?” 

Jensen spluttered, but Jared didn’t stop. “Well you can go to hell, Jensen! I’m going around to talk to this woman, and if you don’t want to come with me, that’s fine!”

“Fine, then I’ll stay here!” Jensen snapped.

Jared stormed off to get his car keys, only to find them missing from the hook once again. Grunting in frustration, he grabbed Jensen’s keys instead. He looked back towards the kitchen, considering, but eventually went out the door without telling Jensen that he was taking his car.

Rachel Trotter lived in a small apartment opposite a strip mall. At this time of night, the stores were closed and graffiti-covered roller shutters were pulled over the doors. Most of the street lights were burnt out, and it felt like a desolate place.

There was no doorbell; Jared rapped gently on the metal frame of the screen door. The front of the apartment was dark, but he could hear the sound of a television somewhere inside. He waited a moment, then knocked again.

Finally, a light switched on behind the door. It spilled through the glass panels and Jared could see a crack running through the central one. The main door opened but the screen door remained closed; the woman inside the house peered up at Jared and said, “What?”

“Mrs Trotter?”

She stared up at him without answering, so Jared cleared his throat and went on. “Um, Mrs Trotter, my name is Jared. I, uh... I live at 1480 Canning Street.”

Rachel’s tired face took on a wary, knowing look, and she straightened up out of her slouch. “What do you want?”

“Um... I’m sorry to bother you at home,” Jared tried, but her expression didn’t soften at all. “I want... some strange things have been happening in the house, and I’m trying to understand...”

“I’m not sure what you think you’re doing here,” she said impatiently. “I served my sentence, alright? I served my sentence, and that’s the end of it. I’m trying to move on, why don’t you let me?”

“I’m sorry,” Jared said automatically. “It’s just that a few things have happened in the house that are a bit... strange.”

“Like what?” Rachel asked, rolling her eyes. “Bumps in the night, things jumping out and saying boo?”

“Well... sort of,” Jared said.”I was hoping you could shed some light on... well, on what happened.”

“I can’t help you,” she said. “It wasn’t my fault, okay? That was all Brian. I would have helped her if I could. I told her I was sorry, but there wasn’t anything I could do.”

A chill ran down Jared’s spine. “So she died in the-” house, he was going to say, but Rachel interrupted him.

“In the bathtub. That was Brian’s idea, too. Easier to clean up afterwards, but she wasn’t as close to dead as he thought. It took days. She screamed and screamed for help. I said we should take her to the hospital.” She scowled up at Jared like she could hear what he was thinking of her. “I did what I could, alright? It was Brian who insisted we cover it up. He’d have the radio blasting all day and all night, but I could still hear her.”

Jared had to look away, the vacant expression on Rachel’s face as she described how her daughter had died becoming too unsettling.

“Why?” Jared asked, wondering why Brian Trotter had been so determined to cover up what he’d done at the expense of his child’s life.

“They used to have the most terrible arguments,” Rachel said. “He’d drink, and she’d hide his car keys so he couldn’t drive. He’d get so furious when she did that. I think she wanted to push him. Maybe she thought she could make him change. I told her not to bother, but she wouldn’t listen to me.” Rachel laughed tiredly. “What do I know, right?”

“Um...” Jared reached for his jacket pocket, feeling the reassuring weight of his phone inside. “I... thanks for your time. I need to go.”

He turned away from the door and began to jog as he reached the footpath. He pulled his phone from his pocket; Jensen’s car keys fell out with it and he picked them up, turning them over in his other hand.

His phone screen was blank, no messages or missed calls. Jared wished he could find that reassuring. He quickly called Jensen’s cell phone, but it went straight to voicemail. He tried the house phone, but it just rang and rang and rang.

Jared ended the call and tapped out a text message as quickly as he could. _uok J call md back?_ He pocketed the phone and got into the car, putting the key in the ignition. He was just buckling the seat belt when his phone buzzed.

 _sorry?_ he read when he checked the message.

 _its ok. I said some shitty things too u ok?_ he replied.

 _sorry?_ came the answer. Jared felt an unwelcome sensation of dread steal into his gut. He called Jensen’s cell phone again and bit on his nails while it rang. 

The line went quiet and picked up with a click like it did when the call went through to Jensen’s voicemail, but the usual message didn’t play. Instead, Jared began to hear the lyrics of a familiar song. He listened for a moment, then dropped the phone like it had burned him and started the car engine, pulling away with a screech of tires.

Luckily for Jared, peak hour traffic was well and truly finished because his journey back to the house would have made any reasonable person seriously reconsider ever getting into a car with him. He kept the cell phone in his lap, and tried calling Jensen again when he was halfway there, but there was still no answer.

The house looked normal from the outside. A light was on in the living room; the rest of the house was dark. It was quiet and nothing seemed obviously out of place. Jared advanced on the front door as cautiously, as reluctantly, as he might lift a cobwebby strip of bark from a fallen branch. The door lurked under the overhanging porch like it was waiting for an opportunity to attack. It didn’t look any different than it had before, that was the thing. It looked like it was ready to swallow Jared whole and spit out his bones, and it always had.

Jared’s hand was shaking by the time he touched the doorknob. He actually jerked his arm away, as though he was afraid the door was electrified or something. The handle felt cold to the touch, cold as ice, but after a minute or so of standing there Jared realised he was going to have to go inside.

He pulled the door open, peering down the dark hall. The light which spilled through from the living room didn’t illuminate much, and nothing that Jared could see was out of place. The television was playing softly, but he couldn’t hear anything else that might indicate someone was inside.

“Jensen?” he called, in a voice which was probably too soft to be heard over the television, but which he just couldn’t seem to make louder.

The light went out and the television fell silent. Jared gripped the edge of the door tightly, but it remained still in his grip, and eventually he pushed it open all the way. He stepped into the doorway and hesitated there, fumbling at the wall for the light switch. He flicked it up and down a few times, but the light didn’t come on. Of course.

Jared looked despairingly at the hallstand where they kept the flashlight. He scrutinised the floor in search of the doorstop, which was nowhere to be found. Well, so be it then. He stepped fully inside and moved over to the hallstand with quick steps. Just as he reached it, the door slammed with a resounding bang, making Jared jump. It was dark inside, without the light from the street coming in, and Jared shivered. He opened the hallstand drawer and felt around for the flashlight. He couldn’t find it. He lifted up layers of restaurant menus and vaguely informative pamphlets for local services, but there was clearly nothing in the drawer which resembled a flashlight.

“Shit,” Jared muttered, searching the drawer one last, frantic time. There was no flashlight, but there was something in there, something which moved and had far too many legs. He felt it crawl up his wrist and when his mind supplied the word ‘spider’ logic deserted him.

Jared shrieked and jumped away from the hallstand, waving his hand around wildly and stamping his feet. The spider fell and, presumably, scuttled away unharmed, although it was too dark to see. Jared brushed his clothes down compulsively, running his fingers through his hair, uncomfortably aware of the way his scream had echoed through the house.

“Jensen?” Jared called again. “Jensen? Where are you?” There was no answer. He nudged open the bedroom door and looked inside. Moonlight was coming through the window and he couldn’t see anyone inside.

Jared looked up the hallway. It was pitch dark and forbidding. He crossed the entrance to the living room, meaning to go that way instead. The television was still on, but there was no picture, only flickering static. It did little to illuminate the room, but when Jared tried the light switch nothing happened, so it was all he had.

Things looked normal enough, as far as Jared could see. A few DVD cases had fallen to the floor in front of the television. Jensen must have cleaned up the kitchen, because the dishes had been cleared from the dining table and were stacked in the drying rack. Jared could see all the way through to the kitchen windows, but no further. He knew he should have been able to see the tree in the backyard, illuminated by the neighbour’s lights, but the windows were inky black like the bottom of a well. Maybe the neighbours were just away, their lights turned off, but Jared didn’t think so.

“Jensen?”

Jared edged past the living room towards the dining table, but paused as he passed the TV. If he looked closely, it was almost like there were two darker spots in the static on the screen. Two vaguely oval shaped spots, sitting side by side about halfway down the screen. When Jared moved, so did they.

He stepped sideways a little faster, moving away from the television, afraid to keep looking at it but far too frightened to turn away. “Jensen!” 

Jensen didn’t reply but music started to play, and Jared couldn’t be sure but he thought it might be a bit louder this time than it had been before. _‘It’s heavenly,’_ cried the singer. Jared started to run, but as he passed the dining table one of the chairs jerked out into his path and he crashed into it. He stumbled and steadied himself by catching the chair, breathing hard.

A whisper seemed to come out of the walls. “No one’s going to hear you.” Jared looked around, but the words weren’t coming from particular spot; they seemed to be all around him. “No one can hear you.”

“Jensen!” Jared screamed, shoving the chair out of his way. The music went on, _‘brings out the devil in me,’_ and Jared reached the kitchen. He ducked out of the way when the freezer door swung open unexpectedly, narrowly missing his head. He scurried past, gasping for breath – not from exertion, but from fear. He stood in the doorway and looked across to the bathroom hatefully. He’d known all along that he was going to end up here, that he wasn’t going to find Jensen in any other room of the house. The door was shut and there was no light shining from beneath it, but he was sure Jensen was on the other side.

“Jensen?” Jared called. He stepped across the hallway and his foot slipped. He fell against the banister of the stairs, banging his knee painfully. “Fuck!” Jared put his hand down on the floor to push himself back up, and found that it was wet. From what, he couldn’t be sure. 

_‘Hell ain’t a bad place to be,’_ went the music, _‘I said, hell ain’t a bad place to be.’_ It was too dark to see but Jared brought his fingers up to his face and sniffed, gingerly. He rubbed his fingers together, feeling the tackiness of whatever he’d touched. Was it blood? He couldn’t tell, but as soon as his mind conjured the possibility he could consider nothing else.

“Jensen!” Jared reached the bathroom door and pounded on it with his fist. “Jensen, are you in there?” 

He waited for Jensen to answer, to say something that would make the whole frightening episode a laughable product of an overactive imagination, like “Wait your turn!” or “Cross your legs!” It didn’t come.

Jared tried to open the door, but it wouldn’t budge. It wasn’t locked; the handle turned but the door was still, like it was stuck in the frame. Or like something was holding it shut. He rattled the knob, putting his shoulder against the door and shoving as hard as he could. It gave slightly, but not enough.

Jared stepped back from the door and lined up a kick. It wasn’t very effective; at the last moment he was too nervous to hit the door with his full force, and his foot barely tapped it. The second kick was better, stronger. Louder, too. Loud enough that Jensen heard it.

“Stop!” Jensen called from inside the bathroom. “Stop it!”

Jared froze. “Jensen?” he yelled. “Jensen, are you okay?”

“Stop it, stop it,” Jensen chanted. Jared wondered if Jensen was replying to him, if Jensen could even hear him. 

“Stand back from the door,” he called, just in case, and kicked it again. He heard Jensen give a frightened yell and felt guilty, but the door had split down the middle and Jared was sure one more kick would be enough. He lashed out with his foot and nearly fell through the shattered remains of the door, stumbling into the room.

“Jensen!” Jared gasped. Jensen was slumped against the wall by the bathtub, his arms up over his head. “Jensen, I’m here.”

Jared crossed the room to Jensen’s side and knelt down next to him. He took one of Jensen’s hands in his. Jensen flinched and whimpered, and Jared said soothingly, “It’s just me, Jensen. It’s just me.”

“Jared?” Jensen whispered, lowering his arms. “Oh, God. You’re here. You have to get out.” His face was covered in blood running down from somewhere above his hairline, and his speech was a little bit slurred.

“We’re both getting out,” Jared said, standing and hauling Jensen up with him.

“She’s not going to let us go,” Jensen argued.

“She’s gonna have to,” Jared retorted. He was grateful for his size for once, as it made it easy to steer Jensen towards the door. “What happened to your head?”

“She threw a glass at me,” Jensen growled. The fragments of wood from the door trembled where they were lying on the floor and they both tensed, but they didn’t move any more than that.

“Come on,” Jared said, taking a step. His eyes went to the mirror, and he froze. In the darkness, it was hard to make out, but he could see his own dim reflection, and Jensen next to him. There was a third figure, too, standing on the edge of the bath. There wasn’t enough light to see any features, just a vaguely humanoid shape, and one hand reaching out...

“Run!” Jared yelled, leaping for the door. They crashed through it, tripping over the splintered wood and falling against the wall of the hallway. Jensen grunted in pain and Jared clutched at him, not willing to take the time to figure out how badly he was hurt. He looked back into the bathroom, at the spot where, in the mirror, an unidentifiable figure had been standing behind him.

The space was empty, of course. Jared was pretty sure he wouldn’t have seen anything even if he’d turned around right then and there. The fear was still almost overpowering. 

Jared looked with purpose at the back door, and began to walk that way, supporting Jensen as well as he could. It was only a few steps; they could make it. They were nearly out.

The glass panels in the door were just as black and impenetrable as the kitchen windows. It was like they’d been transported to another world, like he might get through the door only to find the house sitting in the middle of a desert, or a forest, or a barren moonscape, with no one around for thousands of miles. But there had to be people out there, people who would help them. There had to be someone. Someone would be out there, wouldn’t they?

Jared stared at the door, willing someone to be on the other side, almost imagining that he could see them. And then, like so many other times since they’d moved, he wasn’t sure where the line sat between what he was imagining and what was real, because he thought he could see a face on the other side of the door. There was barely enough light to make it out, but that looked like an eye, down in the bottom left corner, with dark hair hanging down over the face.

“Help!” Jared yelled. “HELP US!”

The face shifted, like the person had been crouching down and was now standing up. Jared could see a mouth, with full, curved lips, which turned into a smile. The lips parted to reveal teeth, and as Jared watched, the teeth sharpened into fangs.

Can’t go that way, Jared thought dimly. Can’t go that way.

He spun around to go to the other door, and an arm stretched out from where the laundry door sat just barely open. The hand closed around Jensen’s wrist and tugged, hard.

“Get off!” Jensen cried out. Jared put his arms around Jensen’s waist and pulled, but couldn’t break the hand’s grip. Jensen braced his foot against the door jamb, but the hand dragged them both inexorably forward.

“Let me go,” Jensen said. “Let me go and make a run for it, Jared!”

“No!” Jared reached into his pocket for his pocket knife, flicking the blade open. He swung at the hand gripping Jensen’s arm, trying to pull Jensen back at the same time. The hand let go at the last possible moment, slipping away into the darkness behind the door like a fish darting down into a pond. Jared stumbled as the resistance pulling Jensen away disappeared, and the point of his knife stabbed into the back of Jensen’s wrist.

“Ouch!” Jensen yelped. 

“Shit,” Jared cursed, seeing blood well up. He hoped the wound wasn’t too deep. “Sorry.”

The ground shuddered, and cracks appeared between the tiles and up the walls. Plaster dust came down from the ceiling. “Oops,” Jared muttered. “Come on, hurry!” 

They stumbled down the hallway towards the front door. It looked longer than normal, and as they ran towards it Jared began to doubt that it was just a product of his fear and the dim light. They weren’t getting closer to the door like they should be.

“You won’t get out,” came a voice out of the walls. “You won’t ever get out.”

“Let us go!” Jared sobbed. The tiles underfoot were uneven, sticking up in odd places and shifting underfoot. Jensen tripped and Jared clutched him with shaking hands.

The walls shuddered. A framed picture came loose and crashed to the ground. Jared stepped carelessly over the glass shards that scattered over the floor, but the door was no closer.

“No one gets out,” the voice whispered. “No one gets to leave.”

“Please!” Jared gasped. His lungs were burning and it was getting harder to hold Jensen up. “You could let us go.”

“You have to stay here. Forever.”

Jared glanced behind him. The back door was far, far behind, but the front door was still way ahead. The hallway stretched much longer than it should have. “You don’t have to,” Jared said, resolutely putting one foot ahead of the other. “You don’t have to stay here. You’re not trapped here anymore. You can leave if you want to.”

He waited breathlessly for a response, still striving to reach a door that was almost too far away to see. Jensen coughed and bent over, vomiting on the cracked tiles. Jared shook with the effort of holding onto him. He didn’t dare stop and check if Jensen was okay; worried as he was about how badly Jensen must have hit his head, he felt compelled to keep dragging him forward.

“You can go now,” Jared said, his voice becoming weak. “You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to.” His legs felt heavy and stiff and his lungs burned. Jared didn’t think he could keep going much longer.

There was a moment of stillness in the house, a pause, like it was drawing breath. And then Jared slammed against the front door, trying to hold onto Jensen and shield him from some of the impact. He looked up, not quite believing that it was true, that they’d made it.

In the living room, the television was still on, still showing a fuzzy, pictureless screen. Jared remembered the eyes that he’d seen there. They were gone now, the screen showing uniform static.

In the corner between the front door and the living room wall, the darkness moved.

Jared leaped away, shoving open the bedroom door and dragging Jensen through it. He slammed it closed behind him. Pointless, Jared thought. Surely what he’d seen wouldn’t be stopped by a closed door? It didn’t even have a lock. He looked around the room frantically.

“How you holding up, Jensen?” he asked. 

“Don’t feel so good,” Jensen mumbled.

Jared backed up towards the bed. He wasn’t sure if he was imagining it, but the dark shape of the door seemed to be growing darker. He reached out, and his hand brushed the shade of the lamp on the bedside table. It had been his grandmother’s, years ago, before he’d moved out of home and she’d given it to him with a pile of other second-hand necessities. It was fifteen inches tall, with a heavy bronze base. 

Jared wrapped his hand around the lamp, just below the shade. He didn’t want to take the time to unplug it from the socket so he yanked the cord from the wall forcefully. He glanced over to the door again; that side of the room definitely looked darker, and if he looked at the right spot the shadows had the suggestion of a head, turned his way.

“Jensen?” he asked. Jensen didn’t answer, but gripped his arm. Jared looked at the window, and wound back for a swing. His first effort shattered the window leaving a jagged, two foot hole. He used the lamp to knock free the glass shards still clinging to the window frame at the bottom and around the sides, but the darkness was closing in and Jared didn’t want to take more time.

“Come on, Jensen,” he said, bringing Jensen to the window. He thought about putting a jacket or something over the windowsill, but Jensen put his hands out and Jared decided there was no time. Jensen put one hand on Jared’s shoulder and unsteadily eased himself through the window, hesitating on the edge before toppling to the ground.

“Jensen!” Jared yelled as he fell out of sight, but he ruthlessly told himself he needed to get out before he could worry about anything else. He got his foot up on the windowsill and glanced over his shoulder.

She was standing behind him, as much as what she was doing could be called standing. Her body was as shapeless and dark as black mist, but Jared could see her face. She looked – sad. Her hair was dark and messy and her eyes were sunken, and the look she turned on Jared was so mournful that he felt sympathetic tears stinging his eyes.

“Don’t leave me alone,” she whispered.

Jared shifted on the windowsill. Glass fragments were cutting into his knees. “You’ll kill me,” he answered.

She gazed at him, an expression of loneliness and loss. “You’ll leave me.”

They froze like that, Jared’s eyes locked to the dark empty eyes of the apparition, neither one knowing how to break the stalemate. As the seconds passed and Jared didn’t climb back inside, her eyes began to narrow and her teeth began to lengthen. She lunged, and Jared flung himself backwards with all his might.

He landed with a painful thump on the porch. Jensen grunted; Jared’s foot had hit him in the chest. He tried to pull himself upright and get his bearings. Were they safe now they were outside, or did they need to be further from the house? Jared couldn’t see anything through the window, but that didn’t reassure him.

“Come on, come on, get up,” he said urgently, yanking at Jensen’s arm. They fell down the steps and landed on the front lawn, but Jared kept pulling Jensen along until they passed the front fence and collapsed on the sidewalk. 

“We got out,” Jared said, panting. 

Jensen was looking around like he didn’t quite believe it. “Yeah,” he said vaguely. 

Jared took Jensen’s shoulders and turned the other man towards him. “Look at me,” he said. “You hit your head. Did you black out? How well can you see?” He held up a couple of fingers, but Jensen wasn’t really paying attention.

“Jared,” he said. “I’m-” he glanced back at the house. “I’m really sorry I didn’t believe you. I’m sorry I didn’t take you seriously.”

“It’s okay, Jensen, I’m just glad you’re alright. Let me see your hand. Did the bleeding stop?”

Jared took Jensen’s left arm, and he flinched. “She grabbed me,” he said. “Her hand was right there.”

“Yeah,” Jared said, remembering. “What did it feel like?”

Jensen’s gaze was distant. “Dead,” he said, shuddering.

Jared looked at Jensen, not liking the way his gaze wandered and how his hands shook. “Come on,” he said, “we need to get you to the ER. Let’s see if the people next door will let us use their phone.”

***

“After today, I vote we never move again.”

“Seconded,” Jared said wearily. “If the building collapses, we’ll just live in the rubble.”

It was a two-bedroom apartment on the third floor. It was in a quiet suburb, and through rigorous research, Jared had established that no one had ever died there. It wasn’t perfect, and they would have to live with the ugly wallpaper since they were renting, but it was somewhere to stay while they waited for the insurance to come through on the house.

The evaluator from the insurance company had seemed puzzled, but put the cracked walls and loose tiles down to earthquake damage. He had told them not to expect a huge payout, but there would be enough to keep them from bankruptcy while they put the house on the market.

Jensen squashed the last kitchen box flat and looked around, pleased. “I like it,” he said. “It’s closer to my work, too. I don’t think I’m gonna miss the old place at all.”

Jared had a few more reservations than Jensen seemed to. “Do you think we’re doing the right thing?” he asked. “If we sell the house and someone buys it, they might get hurt.”

“With the condition the house is in, they’ll have to bulldoze it,” Jensen said. “I think they’ll be safe.”

“You can’t know that, though,” Jared protested, but Jensen just shrugged. “And anyway, if destroying the house does get rid of her – what does that mean? What will happen to her? Where does she go?”

“Don’t really care,” Jensen said. “Hopefully to hell, where she belongs.”

“That’s not fair. What happened to her wasn’t her fault. She was hurt and angry and lonely.”

“Yeah, and she tried to kill us.” Jensen stood in front of Jared. “It sucks, but after what we went through I don’t have a lot of sympathy left over.”

Jared nodded reluctantly, hating that Jensen had a point. Jensen gathered together an armful of boxes and headed for the door.

“Hey, wait – where are you going?” Jared asked anxiously.

Jensen looked down at the boxes with a raised eyebrow. “Down to the recycling bin?”

“Oh, yeah. Of course.” Jared relaxed. “I thought you were leaving.”

Jensen smiled. “I’m not going anywhere, Jared.” He leaned over to peck Jared on the lips. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

Jared kissed him back with a half-hearted smile. “Yeah, I know,” he said. “You won’t leave me.” He watched Jensen pull the door to behind him. “You won’t leave me.”

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